King of Winter, King of Rivers,, King of Ice and Snow
by Fairy of the Friz
Summary: What if Sansa had gone with the Hound after the Battle of the Blackwater? This is the story of a girl trying to find her big brother, and how she helped him keep his crown - and his head. Featuring KitN!Robb, Master of Whispers!Sansa, Master of Laws!Arya and KBtW!Jon Snow. T for canon-typical violence and sexism. Cover by me, poem by poetsbiteback on tumblr
1. Chapter 1 Shut Up and Dance With Me

**Partially inspired by Akatsuki no Yona,** **this was part of my NaNoWriMo entry for 2018. Shoutout to tumblr's kithlessheir, who has consistently attempted to (and usually succeeded in) dragging my arse to hell since 2014.**

* * *

When she enters her room, Sansa is panicking – from the Queen's words, from Shae's, from the screaming and queer lights outside. It is the little doll on her dresser that calms her, this last little piece of her father that no one thought to take away.

From behind her, the other side of her door, there is a slurred, "The lady is starting to panic."

She turns sharply, and finds the Hound leaning against her wall. He is bloodstained and battle-weary, and now that she is paying attention she can smell the stink of him, the reek of wine (it is not the sour Dornish that he prefers, but rather the sweeter Reach blend that is favoured at court).

"What are you doing here?" She demands of him, draws herself upright and fixes her posture as best she can. Despite his kindnesses to her, Sansa is still afraid of his angry eyes, of his horrid truths.

"I'm not here for long." He sighs. "I'm going."

Another bolt of terror lances through her – he might be scary, but Joffrey thinks so too, and has heeded the Hound somewhat when the not-a-knight has told him to leave Sansa be. She will not have his protection if he is _gone_!

"Someplace that _isn't_ burning." Finally he turns his face to look at her. "North, might be. Could be."

Is this a ploy? Is this what – is it as simple as it sounds?

"What about the King?" Are they evacuating? Is she to be paraded in front of the Northern Host, to try and force Robb's hand?

"… He can die just fine on his own," He answers her, taking a swig from a winepouch. "I can take you with me. Take you to Winterfell." She is frozen in place, and then he stands, and walks towards her. "I'll keep you safe… Do you want to go home?"

 _What a stupid question_ , she thinks. _It's all I've wanted since they took my Father's head._ She considers saying _no_.

"I'll be safe here," She parrots. "Stannis won't hurt me." Of course, this is speculation, which is why she does not meet his eyes when she says it. She knows he doesn't abide liars.

He steps forward, and she flinches back, holds a whimper tight between her teeth.

"Look at me!" He demands. "Stannis is a killer. The Lannisters are killers. Your father was a killer. Your brother is a killer. Your sons will be killers someday. The world is built by killers. So you better get used to looking at them."

The knowledge strikes her then, as she stares up in to those hurt grey eyes. She **_knows_** that Sandor Clegane will do everything in his power to keep her safe – has already done so as best he could, in this thrice damned viper pit. _You won't hurt me_ , she says, a fact.

"No, little bird, I won't hurt you." He turns and walks to her door, but she stops him when she says,

"Let me pack? I'll be quick."

She grabs the cloak he gave her and a pack, some food, a waterskin, an old Northern dress that she can resew, a dagger that Shae had slipped her, a shawl, her needles and thread, some socks and paddings, a pair of gloves and a comb. She digs around to find coin and some of the jewels the Queen had lent her, and places the doll her father had given her on top.

"Will this do?" She asks, pulling on a pair of boots she'd been making for Winter. He has spent the five minutes it took her to pack staring, as though he wasn't sure if he was not dreaming.

"Aye, little bird, it'll do. Let's go."

The walk from her room to the stables is fraught with tension. Sansa is terrified that they will be spotted – by a Rat, by a Bird, by a Lion. Sansa knows that Ser Ilyn has already beheaded people for trying to steal a horse, and she knows that she doesn't have a horse of her own anymore, that desertion is treason and she knows exactly what happens to traitors. She had been calm whilst packing, and doesn't realise the extent of the panic that has besieged her heart, until the Hound has shoved her in to an alcove and grabbed her chin, forcing her face up and to his own.

" _Breathe_ , girl!" He hisses at her. She's gasping, she realises belatedly. The Hound shoves his face down in to her own, so that all she can see is his scars and his hair and his features; all she can smell is wine, sweat, blood and smoke. Cooking meat. "You're rattling like a porcelain set, little bird." He growls at her. "Breathe, calm down. You're a wolf, aren't you? You can be brave enough for this."

"Porcelain?" She whispers, voice cracking down the middle.

"Like the maid's shitscared in front of the Lord," He adds. "A rattling teaset."

She thinks of protective Shae, she thinks of her fierce Mother and of sturdy Winterfell, and she draws in a deep breath.

"No." She answers instead. "My skin was porcelain when I came here, that's true. Joffrey was right, I was just a stupid little girl. But I've changed, and I will _keep_ changing. I have gone from porcelain, to ivory, to steel. I _will_ be a wolf once again. I'm sorry, I'll be brave. Lead on."

She lifts her head, and holds on to this new phrasing of hers, wraps _I am a Stark of Winterfell_ around her shoulders like a cloak. _Por-ce-lain, i-vo-ry, steel_ , she chants as they go down the stairs. _Porcelain, ivory, steel_ marks each step she takes through the halls. _Porcelain, ivory, steel_ is the tattoo her heart beats to. Another flare of fire through the windows causes her to skitter back a step, makes the Hound suck in a rattling gasp as his own fear seizes him. _Winter is coming_ , she promises. _No fires then shall harm you – I won't let them_.

They make it to the stables, and the Hound saddles his big black beast whilst Sansa searches for something that will carry her North. She might not be the horsewoman her sister was, but she at least knew what good horseflesh looked like. She found a quiet bay mare to the back of the stables, saddled her and stole a set of saddlebags whilst she was at it, packing her things inside carefully. She grabbed a hoof pick and a hunting bow and quiver on a whim, and made her way back to where Sandor was swearing at his horse.

"Not like that," She told him, stepping in to the stall. Her moves were slow, her voice soft. "What's his name?" She murmured, moving around the stallion, and gently coaxing him in to the last of his tack.

"…Stranger." He grunted, staring. "How'd you do that?"

"I've always been good with animals," She demurred. "Horses and dogs are easy. Cats and people, once you know what they like, can be easy enough too. But birds were always my favourite. That's why I used to like it when she called me _little dove_. They were pretty, but could be fierce sometimes too. I thought it was perfect, for a lady Stark." She drew in a shaking breath, and whispered, "How will we get past the gates?"

"Gold or violence, whatever works." He said shortly, grabbing Stranger's bridle and leading him out of the stables. She follows him, tucked up against the shoulder of her mare, and chants _porcelain, ivory, steel_ to calm herself. They make it to the King's Gate without incident, although there was a moment in front of one of the taverns where Sansa was certain they would be caught. Nearly all of the guards from the King's Gate had been taken to help with the siege, and so they slip through without any witnesses, and put their heels to the horses' flanks.

Sansa is grateful for the full moon, and the lights of the burning Blackwater. It would be just her luck for the mare to trip on a pothole missed in the darkness.

* * *

It is the early hours of the morning when they finally make camp, five hundred metres off of the Kingsroad, and a good distance past Castle Hayford.

"I'm not much help to you, am I?" She whispers to him over the fire, staring at the coals. He had tied up the horses, made the fire, had brought them a ground cover each, provided food. He had gotten them out of Kingslanding. "They were right. I'm just a stupid little girl, with stupid dreams, who never learns."

"Don't say that, little bird."

"You're proving my point. A pretty little songbird in a gilded cage."

"You're a wolf."

"My wolf is dead, Sandor Clegane." He starts, and stares at her in shock. She hasn't ever referred to him by his name before now. "My father is dead, and my baby brothers are dead. My home is burnt to the ground. My sister is missing, and my mother and older brother are at war. I have nothing to my name but – but courtesies! If we find Robb, the only good I'll be to him will be as a _bargaining chip_. I'll be right back where I started."

"So what are you going to do?"

That pulls her up short – it is a good, logical sort of question, like the ones Maester Luwin would ask her to help figure out some of her more difficult housing sums. Sansa still thinks of home, still holds the fortifications of Winterfell around her heart. In her dreams she sees her siblings, remembers them in those last few perfect weeks before everything went wrong. Remembers her missing little sister, who could outshoot all of their brothers. Remembers the times Arya would go skip the sewing circle, and would instead practice with a stolen bow, or climb walls and fences until she found whatever it was she was after.

"Can you teach me to use a bow?" She askes him, voice even quieter. "I stole one from the stables."

"Little bird – "

"Yes or no? Will you or won't you?"

"And what's in it for me if I do?"

"I'll be able to watch your back in fights! And you won't be worried about me, because I'll be away from everything!"

"And what will your mother say when I return you with callouses on those pretty little fingers, and a weapon in those tiny hands?"

Sansa actually laughed then, a real one. "I imagine she'll be shocked, and think that I've swapped out with Arya!"

Sandor watched her, quiet, for quite some time. Sansa watched him back, and remained patient.

"Fine. I'll teach you the fucking bow. But don't come crying to me if you get in trouble for it! Now go the fuck to sleep!"

With a snarl, he picked up his cloak and flopped down on his bedroll. Sansa smiled at him, a tiny little thing, and curled up on her own roll against the mare. Within only a few moments he is snoring, as she stares up at the grey dawn lights filtering through the trees. She knows that she should sleep, she's exhausted. But Sansa somehow just can't let go enough to even doze. All she can see in her head is the faces of her family, hear the words she has tattooed on her own heart – _porcelain, ivory, steel; Winter is coming._

Father, his head removed on Joffrey's orders, his trust in her (her trust in Joffrey and the Queen) so misguided. Mother, kissing her goodbye when she left for Kingslanding. Robb, waving their cart off, a summer fall riddling his curls with snow, and Grey Wind at his hip. Arya, swearing at her over breakfast when Septa wasn't looking, that last day they were all together – both girls lost and without their wolves, her Lady dead, and Arya's Nymeria run away. Bran, dear sweet Bran, who had still been sleeping when they left, only to awaken to legs that would never climb again. Baby Rickon and wild Shaggydog had tried to run behind them, had not understood that they would never return. And their half-brother, Jon Snow, and that white runt Ghost – Gods, she had been terrible to him in their childhood. What must it be like for him now, up on the Wall? Was he warm? Was he healthy? Had he made any friends?

Her thoughts slowly changed, from worrying over missing Arya and frozen Jon, to picturing that wasteland beyond the Wall. Would there be snow? She feels like there must be a lot. She… she thinks that there must be a great deal of trees, big trees like there had been in the Wolfswood at Winterfell.

Would there be wind? Yes, surely there must! Great, blustering gusts of wind, that would whip her hair around her face. And what of Jon? She could see those darks curls of his now, churned by the wind, full of snowflakes as Robb's had been, could see him in his Night's Watch uniform, his dark cloak all tousled too. Could see him surrounded by Wildlings, their cloaks and clothes made entirely of skins and furs. Could see a woman with hair as bright as Sansa's own, taunting him, calling him _Crow._ Could see him being dragged along through a village (was it her village? A part of her believed so, but not the part of her that was Sansa Stark), could see him being pushed in to a larger tent. The part of her that was Sansa wanted to listen, and as best she could she tried, although she didn't understand a great deal. The other part of her, the part that was Oi Dog, wanted to find somewhere warmer, wanted to find food, wanted to play with the children that were hers to defend. There were three of them, all with dark hair and light eyes, two boys and a little girl. The girl was called Aya, and the name was so close to Arya, the face as long and the hair as dark, as Sansa's own sister.

With a pang in her heart, Sansa let go of the part of her that was Oi Dog, and thought instead of Arya Stark.

Where could she be now?

* * *

It feels as though she's only just shut her eyes when the Hound is shaking her awake. He has already readied both horses, and hidden the coals of the fire. Sansa feels terrible that she hadn't been able to help, _again_ , and resolves to get him to teach her when next they make camp.

"Up you get, Little Bird," He says softly. "Time to go."

She scrambles to her feet. "Wait! Before we go, please show me how to draw the bow. That way I can practice in the saddle."

The soft look is now appraising. "Where is it?"

She digs in her saddlebags, and pulls the bow out self-consciously.

"This isn't very powerful," He starts. "See how small it is? This is a self bow, probably belongs to one of the stablehands, someone short. These are supposed to be the same size as the archer, to get any sort of power behind it. It won't have a strong draw, since it's so much small than you, but that just means that you can build up your muscles for a greater bow. Doesn't matter what sort of bow you've got, though, you shouldn't leave any of them strung like this for too long, it fucks them up. See the string down here? You can pull it off, like this, to unstring the bow. When you want to string it though, put the strung end down your instep, like this. Pull this loose end of the string up and over, like this, into the knotch. Show me?"

He hands her back the bow, and Sansa takes three deep, steady breaths. She replays his motions over and over in her head, and then bends to perform the task herself. It is a struggle, even with _such a weak bow_ , but she eventually gets the string on correctly. Sansa holds it up to show the Hound, before unstringing and the restringing the bow again, just to be sure. He nods approvingly, then gestures for her to return the bow.

"When you go to take a shot, you grab an arrow – you've got an arrow, don't ya?"

Sansa gives him a withering look. "I grabbed a quiver, too!" She pulls it out of the saddlebag, and grabs an arrow, which she hands to the Hound with perhaps a little more force than necessary.

He has a nasty smirk on his face when he says _so you do have teeth_. Before she can do anything more than blush terribly, he sobers a little and shows her how to knock the arrow on the bow, and how to draw it back, all the way to her cheek. When he passes her the bow and arrow, he doesn't let go of either immediately.

"We'll practice shooting tonight, alright? Not on the road, I'm not stopping every five metres so you can fetch a fucking arrow, and I don't want you firing behind my back just yet, anyway. Understand?"

Sansa nods seriously, finally takes the bow and arrow, and demonstrates the drawing motion. The muscles in her upper arms protest, as do the ones between her shoulder blades.

"That's it, little bird," the Hound says. "You can feel it, can't you? Here," he taps between her shoulder blades. " _here_ is where you use all of your muscles. Are you ready now?"

"Yes. Let's go."

She packs the quiver back into the pack, swings herself up on to the mare and unstrings the bow. The Hound sets them off at a quick trot that is fast enough to cover ground, but not so fast as to wear the horses out unnecessarily. Sansa gives it a few minutes to familiarise herself with the motion of her mare, and to study the saddle layout. She eventually decides that the same principal applies whether she sits or stands, and so begins to string the bow. She unstrings and restrings it a few times, just to get the feel of how her mare's gait and the act of working the bow go together. Once she is comfortable with drawing, she starts a phantom motion, pretending that she has an arrow in her hand and adding that aspect to her routine, and decides to leave practicing with the actual arrow until after lunch.

Hours pass in mostly comfortable silence; string, draw, sight, ease the pressure off of the bow, unstring, repeat. Occasionally the Hound will make a comment about her technique: _lift your elbow; all the way to your cheek, girl; try drawing_ as _you're lifting to sight, to save time._ They stop for lunch a little less than halfway between Hayford Castle and the town of Brindlewood, and Sansa stretches out her arms, rotates her shoulders, shakes out her fingers and walks around in tight circles. She loosens the saddle for her mare, and ties her beneath a tree in easy distance of some sweet summer grass.

"You're a lot more dedicated than I thought you would be." The Hound says around a mouthful of bread once she sits down beside him.

"Dedication is the trick to mastery," She smiles down at her own bread and cheese. "My mother told me that when I was small – that's why I'm so good at my stitches. I knew that a Lady was supposed to be good at it, so I practiced and practiced until my stitches matched the samplers my Septa showed me. I watched my brothers practicing with their swords with our Master at Arms, so I knew that they drilled each movement until they knew it in their sleep, and then did the same with my stitches. The bow is just another skill, so I thought that the same lessons would apply."

She looks up at him then, and her smile drops. He doesn't – he looks – he looks like someone has just bludgeoned him over the head. "What – ?" she begins hesitatingly.

"Never let anyone call you stupid again, girl." He says gruffly. Hauling himself to his feet, the Hound stalks off in to the neighbouring trees. "Don't look, I'm gonna p – make water."

Blushing scarlet, Sansa looks back down at her lunch, a small smile twitching the corners of her mouth and humming to herself so she won't hear anything. She had shocked him with her dedication, and what he had said – there was a warm worm Sansa's tummy, the likes of which she had almost forgotten the feeling of, after a year and a half of Joffrey. It was _pride_. She had impressed the _Hound_!

Feeling giddy, Sansa got up again and began to move in another circle, humming softly and dancing the tune. Old Northern reels, Robb's favourite for their speed and simplicity, had an easy enough song to sing, and an easy enough dance to match. Kicking, twisting and twirling, Sansa moved her arms and legs enough that she hoped desperately that she would not be too stiff when they next made camp.

"The hell are you doing?"

Sansa froze with one hand in the air and the other holding out her skirt, one leg flung out to the side and the other planted firmly on her heel, ready for the next spin. Swallowing with difficulty, Sansa drew herself back up in to the straight-backed posture of Kings Landing. "Sorry, I was just – it was just dancing, to loosen everything for the ride, and – "

"Was it a Northern dance?" Sansa's hesitation is all the answer he needs. "Homesick, girl?"

Still worrying over what he might say, Sansa snaps a quick, _I need to go too_ , and runs off in to the bushes herself. She needs to change her padding, but isn't really sure how to clean the cloth when they aren't near any extra water. In the end she buries the cloth, and hopes that she might be able to stock up on more later. How long is this supposed to last again? The Queen didn't exactly give her a lot of information about her moontime – Shae was far more helpful, getting her cloths and showing her how to get the blood out of the sheets. She had said that this varied from woman to woman, which wasn't any help at all, but had added that the moontime was usually between three and seven days, and that if she paid attention to the moon cycle, it would warn her when her next blood would come.

Sansa misses Shae already, and it hasn't even been a full day yet.

* * *

They stop just outside of Brindlewood two hours after nightfall, hidden at the bottom of a gully amongst some heather. Sansa has been practicing with the bow all afternoon, but had decided to stop once the sun had set, and had gone to stretching for perhaps ten minutes after that. After rubbing down her mare, a quick dinner and another trip in to the bushes to make water and change her cloth once again, Sansa asks the Hound to show her exactly how to aim and fire her bow.

She doesn't hit anything she aims for, and the string of the bow slaps against the flesh of her lower arm with every release. It is only thanks to Joffrey's tortures that keep her from flinching from the pain.

She decides to take this as encouragement – she can draw quickly, automatically, so now she knows what to concentrate on tomorrow. She is almost grateful to her court torments, for now Sansa pays no mind to any of her aches or pains. She dedicates another half-hour to practicing with real arrows and collecting her missed shots, and then pulls her cloak back on and rolls out the bedding the Hound had brought for her.

Sleep does not come to her tonight any easier than it had that morning, her family's faces swimming behind her eyelids.

 _Father_ _, Mother, Robb, Arya,_ _Bran_ _,_ _Rickon_ _, Jon_.

She knows that Mother is with Robb, and she misses them both terribly. What would they think of her taking up the bow? Mother, of course, would just be happy to have Sansa back, and Robb would no doubt laugh himself sick to see how unladylike she had become. But would learning the bow be enough to let her keep her freedom? No, not likely. Even the Mormont women were not spared marriages, for all their battle-ready ways.

( _they were spared such things because it was said that they were wargs who used bears to father their children. no one dared say anything to the contrary to the Lady Maege or her five daughters._ )

Robb was a King now, so Sansa turned over in her mind the positions that a King needed filled, concentrating on the Small Council in particular to see if there weren't a role that _she_ could fill. Hand of the King, Master of Coin, Master of Laws, Master of Ships, Grandmaester, Master of Whispers, Commander of the City Watch and, traditionally, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard.

Sansa was only just starting out on the bow, so there was no chance of her joining the Kingsguard – if Robb even had one, outside of Grey Wind! – or any City Watch. She knew nothing of Ships, so that was out too. Whilst she was a well-read lady, Master of Laws wasn't exactly a position she could see herself filling – who would take notice of a girl, nearly five-and-ten, when it came to exacting Laws? Who was the correct heir, how much coin was owed for which discretion – no, that was more up Jon's or Arya's skillset, than Sansa's. The same must be said for Master of Coin – Sansa had no true head for numbers, and had to fight for understanding every lesson. As a girl, she could never take the role of Grandmaester, and so that left her with Master of Whispers.

Her mind turned over what she knew of the position, and of Lord Varys the Spider.

( _she pretends this is one of Luwin's puzzles, one of Septa Mordane's quizzes_ )

Lord Varys gathered Whispers, gathered intelligence. He knew who was doing what (or _whom_ , a dirty little voice that sounded suspiciously like Shae, drawled) just about everywhere in Westeros, and in most places in Essos. He knew names and numbers, faces and every sordid detail. He passed on information to the crown, or to other interested parties, to allow enemies of the Crown to fight amongst themselves over a dispute that might have initially set them against the King. He had a legion of people from _all_ walks of life, who told him whatever they heard, and their thoughts on the matter. He knew what was happening, often before it even happened.

 _Could I do that?_

But _how_? How could Sansa Stark even start a network, let alone gather information, whilst on the run?!

 _The Starks of Old were_ wargs _, you know_ , Old Nan's voice drifted to her from the depths of her memories – the end of her first Winter, when Mother was pregnant with Arya and the little hellion had yet to arrive. Old Nan had told scary stories to Sansa, Robb and Jon, until all three were huddled together and shaking with fright. _They could slip beneath the skin of their direwolves. Beyond the Wall, it is said that the Wildlings can slip in to the skin of all sorts of creatures – dogs and wolves, cats and foxes, crows and eagles and all sorts of birds besides._

Crows. _Ravens!_ If the Starks of old were wargs, as the Mormont woman were still said to be, was there any chance that Sansa might be one too? And if so, could she call ravens to her? If she could read ravenscrolls, then she would know what the nobles, at least, were up to. Would that be enough? Could she win her freedom this way? Yes. Sansa was confident that she _could_. And if the Mormont women could warg bears to become their husbands, then _surely_ Sansa could do the same to start off her own information network!

The important question, though, was _how_. How did one become a warg? How did one call down a raven? Well, it was said that Bael the Bard could sing the birds out of the trees. That would be a start.

Carefully, quietly, she sits up and creeps away from their camp. The Hound started snoring almost as soon as he was horizontal, but Sansa doesn't know how light of a sleeper he is. He always mocked her for her singing, before – it's part of why he calls her Little Bird, she thinks – so she doesn't want him to hear her. She doesn't go very far from their camp, just enough that if she sings quietly, he shouldn't wake.

But what song to sing? There were many that she once knew by rote, but she has since locked them all away in a corner in the back of her mind. Did she ever know any about… yes, she thinks that she has it. Gathering her thoughts, making sure she remembers both lyrics and tune, Sansa begins to sing.

 _There were three ravens, sat on a tree,_

 _Down a down, hay down, hay down,_

 _There were three ravens sat on tree,_

 _with a down,_

 _There were three ravens sat on a tree,_

 _They were as black as they might be,_

 _With a down, derrie, derrie, derrie, down, down._

 _The one of them said to his mate,_

 _Where shall we our breakfast take?_

 _Down in yonder green field,_

 _There lies a Knight slain under his shield,_

 _His hound they lie down at his feet,_

 _So well they can their master keep._

 _His hawkes they fly so eagerly,_

 _There's no fowl dare him come nie,_

 _Down there comes a fallow Doe,_

 _As great with young as she might goe,_

 _She lift up his bloody head,_

 _And kissed his wounds that were so red_

 _She got him up upon her back,_

 _And carried him to earthern lake,_

 _She buried him before the prime,_

 _She was dead herself 'ere even-song time._

 _God send every gentleman,_

 _Such hawkes, such hounds,, and such leman._

 _There were three ravens, sat on a tree,_

 _Down a down, hay down, hay down,_

 _There were three ravens sat on tree,_

 _with a down,_

 _There were three ravens sat on a tree,_

 _They were as black as they might be,_

 _With a down, derrie, derrie, derrie, down, down._

The song was old even in Westerosi, older still in the First Tongue, and Sansa had never liked it as a child. But it had a haunting melody, and she had found that if she sung it _just so_ , she would catch the attention of everyone in the room, could raise goosebumps on the men and cause tears in the women. As she sung it now, she concentrated on that particular melody, thought only on ravens and the song itself. She kept her eyes closed, the better to concentrate, and by the end of the song had actually forgotten that she was supposed to be quiet.

( _she hoped the Hound was a heavy sleeper_ )

But on that last, warbling note, she heard a rustling above her head, and spotted three castle-bred ravens staring down at her with those horrible, beady eyes. She had _done it!_

Three caws greeted her once the song was finished. Barely breathing in an attempt not to scare them away, Sansa studied the scrolls carefully, grateful of the still mostly-full moon's light. One had the Lamb and Chalice of House Stokeworth, the second the Twin Towers of House Frey, and the third was the Lion of House Lannister. Drawing in a ragged breath, Sansa reached first for the Frey scroll of the middle raven, and very carefully popped the seal.

( _Maester Luwin had shown her and Arya this trick. not all Maesters could be trusted, he said, and sometimes not all husbands were as kind or respectful as their Father. Sansa was grateful for his lessons now._ )

 ** _My beloved brother,_**

 ** _The family of my husband had turned against you for the favour of the Young Wolf. He has now spurned my goodfather, and brought shame to House Frey. Send a rider to Lord Walder to better discuss the issues of their alliance._**

 ** _All my love,_**

 ** _Genna Lannister_**

Sansa shivered. Lord Tywin's sister had married Lord Walder's second son, and the pair lived still at Casterly Rock in the Westerlands. This was… this was terrible. This was treason against Robb Stark – by law the King of Lord Emmon Frey, and by extent his wife – and it was treason against their leigelord Hoster Tully. If this wasn't handled _very_ carefully, this could be the end of her brother, of their House. And, this was hardly the sort of thing that Sansa could convince Robb of without any _proof_! If she kept the note, then she would have the proof that she would need to protect her brother, but she would also prove to the Freys that they should only rely on riders instead of ravens. _Oh_ , if only she had any skill in forgery! If she could only take a copy of the message for Robb, and send a copy on to the capital, then certainly she could keep her freedom and her brother's life!

With a shaking hand, Sansa takes the missive from the Stokeworths ( _asking after their Lady, who Sansa knows to have broken her hip when she tried to flee Maegor's Holdfast after Cersei had run. It is unlikely that Lady Tanda will survive such an injury, which means that either her first daughter, Lady Falyse, or else her second daughter, Lady Lollys, would inherit. The first is barren and the second simple and with a rape-born bastard – like as not the castle wishes to keep Lady Tanda with them for another while longer, yet._ ), and then the dispatch from the Lannisters ( _Lord Tywin writing to say that he sends his infantry back to Kings Landing for help in the Battle – an old letter? Either a misdirected letter or else a_ very _lost raven._ )

The Lannister letter keeps her eye, however. She's not sure what it is yet, but she knows that there is something familiar in the letter. What was different about it from the others? Not the quality of the parchment, though there were less grubby fingerprints over it compared to the terrible Frey letter. Was it how it was tied to the raven? Yes, that was it! The first two had been tied by someone right-handed, and the Lannister letter was tied by someone left-handed – the knot was the same as the one Arya, of all of them, had used to tie. But, it was _more_ than that. Sansa decided to let the matter stew in the back of her head for a while; it would come to her.

Offering her arms, Sansa allowed the birds to settle, one to each shoulder and the last on her head. Quickly as she could without dislodging the birds, Sansa returned to their campfire, and placed the birds on lowhanging branches. Turning back to the second letter, Sansa carefully refolded the parchment, and used the embers on the end of one of the sticks to melt the wax _just_ enough to reattach it properly. Replacing Castle Stokeworth's letter, Sansa thanked the bird quietly, and gave it a tentative smile. Facing the Lannister bird, Sansa chewed on her lip as her mother and sister were wont to. Deciding that no one would miss such a late bird anyway, she used some cooled charcoal to quickly scribe a letter for Robb.

 ** _Grey Wind,_**

 ** _Lady ran away. Have not seen Nymeria since the alpha's slaughter. Beware the Rat King you spurned._**

 ** _All my love and prayers,_**

 ** _Winter is Coming._**

The code is a simple one, but hopefully her brother would understand it! He had the Kingslayer, so she prayed that neither he nor mother had tried to ransom the knight for either Arya or herself. Using that ember from before, Sansa reattached the wax of House Lannister, and fiddled with it until it looked less like lion, and more like a rearing, dancing direwolf, and strokes the head of the third bird.

"In the morning, would you take this to Riverrun?" Sansa whispers to the creature, picturing in her head all the tales her mother had told of her own childhood home. It bobs its head a few times and gives a soft croak, which Sansa hopes means the same in raven as it does in human. "Thank you."

Finally, she looks to that first letter. She takes a few moments to draw in deep, even breaths, and whispers to herself what strength she can ( _Winter is coming; porcelain, ivory, steel; in winter, we must protect ourselves – look after one another; the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives_ ).

She has always prided herself on her pretty handwriting. Septa and Mother both used to coo over it, but Arya had always glowered – Septa used to rap Arya's knuckles for her _chicken-scratch handwriting ._ Sansa's handwriting is the same as her sewing, as her archery, a constant state of _practice practice practice._ Her handwriting had once been as terrible as Arya's, but she had kept at it and at it and _at it_ until her handwriting had matched what she could see in the books. So maybe, if she employs that same tactic here, she can copy – can _forge_ – the writing of House Frey, and take it to Robb. Sansa breathes deeply, carefully, for a few minutes longer, draws herself up with the iron wrath of her mother and the strength of Winterfell's walls, and starts to dig through her saddlebags for a bit of parchment. Hopefully, _hopefully_ , she had packed – yes! And it was almost the same quality of the Frey letter, too! But had she packed an inkwell? No, but she did have charcoal and water, wouldn't that do?

The next hour is spent grinding and mixing until she has the right consistency to match the Frey's ink, and then practicing until she can write the horrible letter out perfectly, down to each bloody ink splatter. She's lucky that she had a loose quill in her bag before she packed the other night, else she might have had to beg a feather off of one of the ravens. Once she is happy with her attempts at forgery, Sansa seals up the missive too, and keeps the original message to show to Robb and his host. With her task finally finished, Sansa thanks the birds and slip down on her bedding, tugging the cloak around her as she does so.

It isn't until the next morning that she realises that the snoring had stopped when she was singing.

* * *

The muscles of Sansa's arms and shoulders are _killing_ her, and her thighs are just as painful. When she tries to get up at sunrise, all she can do is hiss her breath in through her teeth, and try to stretch out the cramps in her muscles. Her smallclothes feel wet and uncomfortable, so she tries to right herself as quickly as she can to change her padding once again. She is not looking forward to today, and if she never has to ride on her moonblood again, it will be far too soon. The only good thing so far is that the ravens have left.

The Hound is awake and watching her, when she returns. This is when she realises that he was snoring when she went to take care of herself, and when she first went to try and call down ravens, but was _not_ snoring when she was reading the correspondence and beginning her new career as Robb's Master ( _Mistress?_ ) of Whispers.

"What happened last night, Little Bird?" He asks her, voice soft and perhaps even more terrifying for it.

"I want to make myself useful," She whispers. She begins by looking at her feet, but realises that, if she makes it back to Robb, she'll have to look great Lords in the eye, from friendly Lord Manderly to scary Lord Bolton; so, she looks him in the eye, instead. "Robb is a king. Kings have Small Councils, and so I went through all of the traditional positions on the Council to try and figure out what I _could_ do. And then I remembered the Old Stark stories, and I thought – maybe I could be Robb's Master of Whispers. So I called ravens to me, and read their messages, and copied down what I could so that I can prove what I know to him."

The Hound stares at her for a while longer.

"Could – could you teach me how to break camp, please? I want to be more helpful."

"Bird, you were practicing the bow all yesterday, and you were up late last night with your singing. It's fine."

"No," Sansa says firmly. "We are at war, and I cannot afford to show any weakness. If there is one thing I know I can do, it is act fine whilst in pain. Please, Sandor Clegane. I need to know."

He stares at her for another long, drawn out moment ( _Nan was right, names_ do _have power!_ ), and then nods once, and begins the slow process of How To Break Camp. He walks her through how to douse the fire and hide the evidence of it, how to spread debris across their campsite to mask their tracks, and how to bury the horses' mess and disguise their passage. They have cheese and apples for breakfast in the saddle, and once she has finished, Sansa returns to her archery practice. This time her routine is _string, draw,_ _ **aim**_ _, ease tension, unstring, repeat_. At lunch they make the Ivy Inn, but neither Sansa nor the Hound are willing to be spotted so early in their travels; their lunch is eaten in the surrounding woods. Sansa shakes out her limbs, relieves herself and changes her padding once again, and then practices actually _shooting_ five of her arrows – just enough to get the general feel of everything, without having to spend too long _looking_ for her missed shots. She has a bit more of an idea as to how much draw is required for particular distances, and managed to get one in five shots to land on her tree targets.

She's feeling a good deal lighter, as they make their way along the Kingsroad, so she is humming to herself as she practices. The Hound thinks that they should hit the next village by nightfall – and of course by that, he means they should be able to camp in the area _around_ the village. This time they will not have a fire, but the nights are still warm yet, by Northern reckoning, so Sansa doesn't mind too much. It is just the cricks in her back that she resents.

"Bugger it all, Bird, what are you humming that song for? I thought you liked them bright and happy!" The Hound exclaims. They still have a few hours of travelling time to go, and Sansa is jolted out of her rhythm by the noise.

"I – what?" She hadn't even noticed what she was humming, if she is honest. _The Three Ravens_ had never been a favourite of hers anyway. "Sorry, I'll try to think of something else."

He goes to snap something at her, but they both freeze when a black feather floats between their horses. It is soon followed by two ravens, who land on Sansa's mare and caw at her in greeting.

"What witchery is this?" The Hound whispers, pale under his scars.

Sansa swallows hard, and whispers back, "Warg. It's called warging. The Starks of Old could do it and, it looks like I can too." Pulling her mare off to the side of the road and tying the dear up, Sansa offered each arm to the ravens. One is another Lannister message from Harrenhall, and the other is a mockingbird, of all things. Sansa is sure that she has seen that sigil around the castle _somewhere_ – but where? Taking a shuddering breath, Sansa reaches for the Lannister letter first. Using Maester Luwin's trick, she peels back the wax, and lets out a cry.

"What is it?" The Hound is behind her, Stranger tied up on a separate tree to the mare. He takes the parchment from her, and scans the letter quickly, taking in the infantry report from Lord Tywin.

"This information is old," He murmurs reassuringly. "Your brother is fine, they won this battle."

"This is not Lord Tywin's handwriting, is it?" Sansa askes him.

"No, Bird – must be a scribe."

She took the letter back carefully, and points at the writing. "See how the letters slant to the left? And the ink splatter, see how it's more smudged on the lower ends of the letters? This was written by someone left-handed. And when it was tied to the raven, it had been tied by a lefthanded person as well – so was the old note from last night."

"And?" The Hound growled, confused.

"But the knots on these two notes, and this handwriting – this is Arya's. This is _my sister's_ handwriting! She's been missing since our household were executed, but how on earth did she end up at Harrenhal? Even for Arya, that is …"

"Lots of lefthanded people out there, Bird," He said softly. "If Tywin had her, Joffrey and Cersei would have made sure you knew it."

"Not if they didn't know it was her!" Sansa exclaimed. "Tywin has never met my sister, and only knew our father in passing – he might not have recognised her! And no one ever picks Arya as a lady, anyway – you saw what she was like, when we came down from Winterfell! And this explains why these messages are late – Arya would do everything in her power to help Robb without selling herself out too."

"Alright, say that your sister wrote this," He said patiently. "What are we going to do? Storm the castle?"

Sansa's joy evaporated at that. It was a good question, unfortunately, and one that she didn't have an answer to.

Folding up the first note, Sansa tucked it in to her saddlebags ( _no need for the Crown to have any information on the Northern Host, no matter if it is out of date or not._ ) and reached for the second letter. "Who has a mockingbird as their crest?" She asks numbly, carefully popping the wax.

"Littlefinger," It is not a human noise that Clegane makes here – it is truly a Hound's growl of hatred. "Slimey, slippery cunt. What does he say?"

"He's to marry my Aunt Lysa! But this letter … it is very informal. Did they know each other well?"

"Oh, aye. He was fostered at Riverrun, grew up with your mother and her brother and sister. Court gossip has it that he took your mother's maidenhead."

Sansa's head jerked up then, face blushing. "He did _not_! How did that even come up?!"

"You know what the Capitol is like," Clegane shrugs, then scoffs. "What, did you think your parents were both pure for each other when they were first wed?"

"Mother was intended for Father's older brother, my uncle Brandon, and Father was a second son," Sansa says with careful emphasis. "And I am _not_ talking about my mother's maidenhead with you!"

He barks out a laugh, and then makes a motion for Sansa to show him this letter, too.

 ** _Dearest Lysa,_**

 ** _I write with good tidings! I have been awarded Harrenhal for my services to the Crown – Lord Tywin himself has arranged for a marriage between us. I sail for the Eyrie within only a few short weeks. Patience, my dear, and we shall have everything we desire._**

 ** _Petyr_**

He hums, and asks her, "Do you know what this means?"

"Aunt Lysa hasn't declared for any King yet," Sansa answers promptly. "The Vale is the only neutral Kingdoms right now. Lord Baelish is loyal to the Lannisters, so by having her married to him, it will bring the Vale under the Lannister banner." She gnaws on a thumbnail, thinking. "What do you know about him? Lord Baelish?"

"He runs the best-off brothel in Kings Landing," He says promptly, causing her to blush brighter than her hair. "He gives the Spider a run for his money, when it comes to spies. Littlefinger has his fingers in lots of pies, girl. He was Master of Coin, but if he's about to become the Lord Protector of the Vale, then I suppose some other poor cunt will have to fill that position." He stares at her levelly, and quietly finishes. "He's the reason your father is dead, and not at the Wall."

Sansa feels the blood drain from her face, her hands drop to her side.

"… What? But – Joffrey, he – !" She feels… hollow.

"The Queen and the Spider were going to send him to the Wall. Your father had found out that Cersei's children were by her brother, so she wanted him far enough away that he couldn't tell anybody about it. They knew that if they killed Ned Stark, the North would rebel. Joffrey was fine with the idea, up until the night before that farce of a trial. The only person who talked with Joff that night was Littlefinger. When your father tried to have Joff and the Queen removed, Baelish had ordered the Gold Cloaks to side with the Crown, and held a blade to old Ned's throat himself."

Sansa can hear her blood roaring in her eyes, can feel her heart pounding in her chest.

"Of course," she murmured. "Joffrey was not clever enough to come up with such a thing on his own." Sansa folds the note back up again carefully, and looks at the two ravens. "Will you stay with us?" She asks politely, thinking very hard on what she meant in, hopefully, bird-friendly terms. "Rest with us awhile, and then you are welcome to fly on to your destination."

Both birds caw and nod at her, so Sansa takes that as a win. Swallowing, she turns back to Clegane to let him know she'll be a moment, and ducks off in to the bushes to change her padding again whilst she has the opportunity to. Her hands shake the whole time, and there is still a thin tremor in her clenched fingers when she returns, unties the mare, and hauls herself back up in to the saddle. She unstrings her bow, guides her horse back to the road, and kicks the mare's withers sharply, wheeling the creature North again. Both ravens sound a series of caws, like the laughter of the dying, and wheel overhead.

"Little Bird!" Clegane shouts from behind her. "Wait!"

When they were younger, Arya had always loved riding. She had loved the freedom of it, the wind blowing so hard in their ears that Arya couldn't hear if she was being scolded by their parents, or whomever was supervising the lesson. Sansa had never loved riding as her sister did, had known that a lady wasn't supposed to enjoy such things, but that a Northerner must be able to sit her mount. She had suffered through their lessons, and claimed to loathe every one.

Years later, Sansa now feels so much closer to her sister than she ever had before. All she could see in front of her crouched form was her horse's mane, and all she could hear was the wind. All she could feel was the chill of winter approaching.

For a while, she gave the mare her head and just _breathed_ , not thinking, and trying to understand even a fragment of what she was feeling. By the time the mare had calmed back down to canter, Sansa had decided to let herself think on how to handle this new information.

Firstly, Arya. Most likely her sister was at, or around, Harrenhall. So what was Sansa going to do about that? She could send the raven straight to her sister. Something simple, like she had sent Robb, only this time she and the Hound could wait in the woods around Harrenhall for Arya to come to them. Then the two of them could go to Robb and Mother together!

Okay. That was one problem solved. Problem two.

Petyr Baelish had betrayed her father. He was going to marry her aunt, and send the Vale's forces against Robb, against Lysa's own sister and nephew. ( _addendum – he had also spread terrible lies about Catelyn Stark at court._ )

He was going to pay for his crimes, and Sansa wanted him to know that _she_ , Sansa Stark, eldest daughter of Catelyn and Eddard Stark, was responsible. So. How to achieve this? Baelish said that he was traveling by ship in a few weeks. If Sansa remembered her geography correctly, then she knew that the only way to approach the Eyrie was through the Bloody Gate, and the only way to that ( _for those unskilled in crossing the Vale ranges_ ) was the High Road. The quickest way for someone taking a ship to get on to the High Road was by either docking at the Saltpans, or at the Rubyford, and the Saltpans were closer.

If she became a good enough shot, could she and the Hound make off with Baelish, and present him to Robb? But, how would they get him from the river to Robb's camp? Where even _was_ his camp? She'd ask Clegane, and see if he didn't have an idea.

With that, Sansa gently eased her mare down to a trot, and looked over to Stranger and Clegane.

"I'm sorry," She said. "I shouldn't have let my temper get me like that. I'll try not to let it happen again."

"S'fine, Little Bird." The man grumbled. "Just let me know before you do something like that next time, ok?"

She nods contritely, and they ride on another league in silence.

* * *

 ** _Nymeria,_**

 ** _We're two days fromf Harrenhal. We'll take you to Grey Wind with us._**

 ** _All my love,_**

 ** _Lady_**

The raven had showed up just as Arya, Gendry and Hot Pie had decided to make camp, with a note written in a familiar pretty scrawl on the back of the original letter Arya had scribed for Lord Tywin.

"What's it say?" Hot Pie whispered, breaking their silence. Arya realised she was shaking, so sat down on a root, heavily.

"My sister is two days out of Harrenhal. She wants to take me to Robb." She draws in a ragged breath, and whispers, "But it has to be a trap. My sister was a prisoner of the Lannisters, and too stupid to get herself out of Kings Landing."

"What are you going to do?" Gendry asked, watching her face.

Arya worried at her bottom lip. "I don't know. Just keep the letter and ignore it?"

"But what if it is your sister?" Hot Pie asks. "Don't you want to see her? You told Jaqen you couldn't go with him because you had to find her, right?"

Arya glared at him. "I know what I said! But I don't want to just hand us over to the Lannisters, either – we still don't know why they wanted Gendry."

"Send something back." Gendry offered. "Get her to prove that it isn't a trap."

Arya nods slowly, churning ideas over in her head. How was she going to pull this off?

"I don't have anything to write with."

"Use a bit of charcoal from the fire," Hot Pie said. "Will that work?"

"Yeah… yeah, thanks Hot Pie. Alright, I know what to write!"

* * *

 ** _Lady,_**

 ** _Prove it._**

 ** _Nymeria_**

The bird Sansa had sent to Arya was back already, and she'd only let it go _yesterday_. It was such an Arya letter too – terrible handwriting, straight to the point, and completely suspicious. It was written with charcoal, so quite likely Arya had managed to escape Harrenhal. Sansa was unbelievably glad of that, as one of the ravens she'd received after sending away Arya's bird had been a letter from a Lannister guard, letting Lord Tywin know that everyone at Harrenhal had been executed, as per instructions. Sansa had collapsed when she'd read that note, choking on a cry that she refused to release. Clegane had picked her up and placed her on her bedroll by the fire, and tried to coax her in to trying a bit of bread, without any luck. The return of the bird had been the return of Sansa's hope.

"She's _alive_ ," She calls to Sandor hoarsely. "Arya, she wrote me back!"

Quickly Sansa pulled out her new raven-feather quill and began the long process of making ink out of ground charcoal.

 ** _Nymeria,_**

 ** _Don't you dare die on me, sister, we are going_** **home** ** _. Winter is coming. When the snow falls and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the Pack survives. We will get back to Grey Wind, and avenge Alpha, Shaggy and Summer, too._**

 ** _Lady_**

It was only lunch time, so Sansa looked to the bird and asked, "Please, would you find her for me again?" She received an almost put-upon caw in return, and then the bird took flight.

"I'm glad for you, Little Bird," Sandor Clegane says softly. "Now, please eat something."

Sansa smiles at him brightly, and hooks straight in to the last of their bread and cheese. They'll need to stop at a village or holdfast soon, or else they will need to hunt. Sansa tries to shoot at least two hundred arrows every day, has worked through tight, straining muscles to improve her draw speed, and yet still does not believe that she could catch a single rabbit. She has yet to say as such to Clegane, mostly because she doesn't want to hear his spiel about monsters and killers again. Her fears are not because of the grief of taking a life – she is hungry, Clegane is hungry, and it is within her power to fix that, so she will. It is rather because she fears that a rabbit is yet too fast and small for her steadily growing accuracy.

But that is a worry for later. Right now, she is going to eat her lunch, fire twenty arrows, and then attend to the half-dozen birds that have been waiting for her to pay attention to them.

There are two letters trying to arrange marriages (one was a Lannister cousin, asking for the King's blessing, and the other was a message from a Riverland Lord to a Dornish one); one letter is from Lord Selmy of Tarth to his daughter, asking her what she was doing swearing herself to _Lady Stark_ , and begging her to return to the Stormlands; one was from Wickenden for the Citadel, saying that their Maester had suffered a heart attack and died, and asking if a replacement could be arranged. The fifth is from Gulltown, insisting that some Fleabottom merchant or another pay his due for the import of Lorathi liqueurs; the sixth is from Lady Crakehall, making sure her son survived the siege of the Blackwater. Once Sansa has read each letter, she refolds them and reattaches the wax, and sends the birds back on their way. The letter to Brienne of Tarth begs her to let Lady Catelyn know that her daughters are safe, making their way to her, and missing her every day.

As she goes to remount her mare, Sansa pauses and then turns to Clegane.

"I should name her soon," She muses, stroking the creature's neck.

"Aye? What are you going to call this one, Queenie? Duchess?"

"Don't be mean." Sansa scolds, stroking the mare's nose and looking in to her dark eyes. "I think I'm going to call her Mercy."

"Mercy!" Clegane exclaims, derisive.

"As you called your horse _Stranger_ , you have no room to scold. So, Mercy it is."

Sandor gives a terrible, barking laugh, and gives Stranger a sharp kick. The sooner they reach Harrenhal, the sooner they can find Arya and head North.

* * *

Arya chews on her bottom lip and glares at the letter. The raven and the two boys both watched her struggle, until finally a tentative Hot Pie asked what it said.

"I think it _is_ Sansa. But I still don't know how she got out of Kings Landing, or who she's with. She keeps writing _we_."

"So ask her," Gendry grumbles.

Arya reads the letter to them, scowling still. "I'll wait to find out, I guess – just in case the letter goes to someone else. And anyway, I've said _we_ too, so she can puzzle over _that_!"

 **Lady,**

 **We're moving North. Get your bird to find us.**

 **Nymeria**

* * *

Harrenhal is _smoking_. The wind blows the acrid smoke towards them, and Sansa can smell death on the wind too. Very carefully, she and Clegane stick to the tree cover, just in case. They do not know if there are any scouts left, or perhaps even looters who have come to try their luck, and are not willing to risk their lives.

Sunset is yet another two hours away, and both Clegane and Sansa want to see if they cannot find Arya and her mysterious _we'_ s before they make camp. The sooner Arya is with them, the sooner they can get back on to the road and on to Robb and Mother. There is rather a lot of forest, however, and Arya is nothing if not difficult when she does not wish to be found.

As per Arya's last letter, Sansa has tried asking the raven if it can lead them to her little sister, but all the birds does is shrug and caw at her. When it began to get too dark for the horses to safely carry them, the humans had dismounted and proceeded to lead the beasts behind them, searching northwards. An hour after sundown sees them making camp instead, with Sandor preparing dinner and Sansa reading through her correspondences. There is another betrothal request from two Westermen banners, another letter of abuse for a Flea Bottom trader, and a request from the Quiet Isle for linens and oils from the Septons.

Out of worry, Sansa takes up her bow after dinner. She had already shot fifty arrows at breakfast, and twenty at lunch. Instead of her remaining hundred-and-thirty shots, Sansa shoots a full two hundred arrows – most of them manage, at the very least, to hit the trees that she is aiming for.

Clegane watches her carefully, speaking only to correct her posture or style. When it looks as though she means to fire more than her expected two hundred, he rouses himself to say, "Enough, bird. We'll find her. Go to bed."

Sansa's arms are shaking from the effort, but her heart is still heavy with worry, and her head loud with all the thoughts she doesn't know how to address. But it will not do for them to exhaust themselves before they make it to Riverrun, so Sansa numbly agrees to unstring her bow and lie on her bedroll.

She cannot sleep – she is terrified that Arya will slip through her fingers and be lost to her as surely as Father.

Will Arya hate her? Hate her for thinking herself in love Joffrey, for being kept a prisoner for so long, for having the Hound as her rescuer. Perhaps Arya will rage at Sansa for hypocritically picking up the bow, after all her scolds and arguments, or maybe even for the letter she had been made to write Robb when Father yet lived.

Sansa does not know, and cannot bare the thought that her sister might not want her anymore.

She tosses and turns for what feels like hours. The raven she has been sending to Arya finally must tire of this, and flies down to land on her chest. It stares into Sansa's eyes with its own beady black until they are all that Sansa can see. In their depths, she can see her own blue eyes reflected back at her from her drawn, pale face, framed by hair the same vibrant fire as her mother's.

Something shifts. It is not so much that Sansa sees her reflection anymore, so much as she feels as though she is looking at _her own body_ from _within the raven's_! She is warging for true, now!

In the back of her head, Sansa feels the Raven stir. It moved forward as she stepped back, for lack of any better description, and together they took flight. Going from tree to tree, the bird dug his claws in to the branches until a mark was left behind. She could feel the bird's ire at the slow pace – she could tell now, that the raven had been flying above the leafcover until he'd been close to Arya, and then sneaking down to her and her companions. The raven provided their faces for Sansa – a tall boy who looked eerily like Renly Baratheon, and a much smaller boy with a considerable girth and a tumble of curls.

By distances, however, they are still some way away – with this underbrush and the horses, they won't make it to Arya and her companions until after midday, Sansa doesn't think. So she thanks the raven for the distance it has already marked out – a few leagues, at least – and has it take to the wing. They fly much more quickly, without having to slow down to leave markings. Soon, Arya's campsite is within view, tucked up against an ancient ivy-riddled wall, and together Sansa and the raven spiral down through the gaps in the branches, and alight just above Arya's head.

" _Joffrey. Cersei. Ilyn Payne. Ser Meryn. Polliver. The Mountain. The Hound._ _Valar Morghulis._ "

 _Aaar, aaaar, aaar._ She/the raven caws. Arya looks up at them, startled.

"Dark wings, dark words." Her little sister whispers. "Have you come to take my prayer to the Old Gods? I'm going to kill all of them, you know. I'm going to have vengeance for my family."

 _Aaaarrryaaaa_ , they caw together, half of them distraught.

The girl beneath them, with her Stark features, jolts.

"What?" She whispers, crouching and holding out an arm. "Did you just…?"

 _Aaaarrrrryaaaaa!_ The raven lands on the outstretched arm as gently as possible.

"Who _are_ you?"

 _Hisssssaaaaa-hisssaaaa_

"… What?"

 _Ssssaaaa-ssssaaaa_

"Sansa?!" She exclaims, standing abruptly. "What? How?"

The raven cannot make the right sounds for _warg_ , so they drop to the ground, and Sansa instructs the bird in how to drag his beak through the loamy soil to spell the word instead. Arya makes a choked little noise.

"It _has_ been you sending those stupid letters?"

Stupid. It has been Arya's favourite word since she was three years old.

Sansa and the raven nod and ruffle their feathers, almost-proud.

"Are you walking?"

A shake.

"Riding? You have horses?"

A nod. Arya swallows hard, nods back, and then her eyes cut to the two boys with her.

"I don't know if they're believe me, about waiting for you. We may as well keep going North until you catch up with us – you'll take too long, otherwise."

This makes Sansa laugh – a serious of sharp _arh, arh, arh_ s coming from their beak.

"Does this bird have a name?" A headshake. "Right. Well, have Sorrow tell you where I am and how to get to me. You'll catch up eventually."

Oh, her brave, stubborn little sister! Sansa had Sorrow – what a name! – flit on to Arya's shoulders, and gently comb their beak through the rough-sawn locks. Arya's tiny hand reaches up and strokes down the bird's back, and Sansa can feel how her little sister shakes.

Hopping back to the ground, Sansa and Sorrow etch a heart in to the soil, and look Arya expectantly.

Arya bursts in to tears and collapses to the ground, which startles Sansa and wakes the two boys as well.

"I don't hate you!" Arya sobs. "I never hated you, I just didn't like the same things you did or want to be a lady! I'm sorry I left you behind and I'm sorry Lady died!"

"Arry?!"

 _Aaarryaaa! Aaaryaaa!_ Sorrow is distressed by the crying and doesn't want to go any closer to Arya, but Sansa wants to comfort her sister more than anything, and so the two flutter around Arya's head, land on her shoulder and comb through her hair again.

"Saaansaaa!" The poor girl wailed.

"Arry, what's with the bird?!" The chubby boy asks.

"Did you have a nightmare?" The tall boy asks, haltingly and almost gently.

"My sister is the bird you idiots!" Arya howls. "She warged it!"

"Warg?" Asks the shorter boy.

"It's Northern magic," The tall one said. "Right?"

Taking big gulping breaths, Arya nods jerkily and hiccupped, "My – sister – is inside – the bird."

"Can you do that?" The shorter boy exclaims.

"Shut up, Hot Pie. Arry, is that the raven from before?"

"His name is Sorrow," Arya nods, calming down. " _One is for Sorrow_ , you know?"

From the looks on their faces, Sansa would say that _no_ , the boys _didn't_ know. But they were tactful enough not to say anything, and both cuddled down next to Arya and leant their shoulders tight up against hers.

Sansa cawed at her sister worriedly, and had a hand flapped at her.

"I'm fine, Sansa. Go back to sleep. Find us tomorrow."

Sansa flies Sorrow to land at Arya's feet, taps the heart she had drawn before, and closes her eyes. She "steps back" from Sorrow in to her weary body. Finally, sleep has come for Sansa Stark. Tomorrow will bring her ever closer to her baby sister.

* * *

 **If you enjoyed, please leave me a review! _Constructive_ criticism is always appreciated, as well!**


	2. Chapter 2 (You've Got) Something I Need

**AN – Thank you everyone for the beautiful reviews, but especially to Mary of AO3 (I'm assuming you're the same person?) and Mari Wollsch of , who reviewed on both Kings and AtU. Drunk me waxed poet about everyone's reviews for an actual hour on Australia Day, and now all my work mates think that all my readers are great. My husband, however, has had to put up with my fangirling through various states of sobriety and lack there-of, so your names are kind of mud atm ¯\\_(** **ツ** **)_/¯**

* * *

One of the shepherds of Winterfell had once told Arya that he always knew how to find home again because of the moss that grew on the tree trunks. She had spotted the same moss growing in the thickets surrounding Harrenhal. Moss grew thickest on the North side of trees, so Arya had been marching herself and the boys in that same direction. Sansa and her mysterious "we" were behind them, and Robb and Mother were ahead of them, _expecting them_ , and Arya couldn't wait. Even Gendry's complaining (a ploy to distract her from last night's hysterics) wasn't going to deter her good mood.

Unfortunately, it also left them distracted. They didn't see the company of men, and though they heard the singing – _The Reynes of Castamere_ , Sansa had been practicing it on the trip to Kings Landing, before Lady died – the warning didn't come until too late. They couldn't hide from the company, though they tried, and couldn't threaten them either, despite Arya's best efforts. When Thoros of Myr introduced himself, Arya had a moment of recollection of seeing the red man talking to her father at the Hand's Tourney, and hoped desperately that she would not be recognised. Sansa was close, she knew it – Sorrow had been flying back and forth with scraps of paper between the sisters all morning – and Arya already had two useless people depending on her waterdancing. Thoros was some great warrior from across the sea, and even Arya Stark could only do so much.

"Who do you fight for?"

"The Brotherhood without Banners. Now come along – I want to know how two boys and a _very_ dangerous girl escaped Harrenhal."

"I'm not going with them!" Hot Pie hissed. "The Brotherhood? That's who the Mountain and all them was looking for. They'll bring us back and put rats in us!"

"You've nothing to fear from us, son." Thoros interrupted. "The Lords of Westeros want to burn the countryside. We're trying to save it. Now come on. We'll talk some more over brown bread and stew. And then you can go on your way."

Hot Pie began stepping backwards, and Gendry was easing off too. On the edge of her hearing, Arya thought she caught a crow's caw.

Anguy, the archer, readied his long bow, and fired straight up in to the sky. "Here's the thing, fat boy. When I'm done talking, that arrow is fallin' down on your fat head. So I advise you move, because I'm done talking."

"Sorrow look out!" Arya screamed. A flurry of black feathers heralded the raven, who collided with Hot Pie's shoulder and pushed him closer to Arya, and out of the way of the arrow. Hissing, Sorrow then flew in to Anguy's face.

"Geddit off of me!" Snarled the archer, flailing. Sorrow flew out of the way, shat on Anguy's face, and finally settled on Arya's shoulder. Holding him steady with her right hand, Arya flourished the stolen sword with her left.

"Sansa?" She breathed. Sorrow tweaked her ear affectionately, and slipped a piece of paper down the back of her collar.

"The fuck is that bird?!" Anguy shouted, swiping mess from his eyes.

"His name is Sorrow." Arya answered evenly. "He's with me."

"A dangerous girl with a dangerous pet!" Thoros crowed. "And how did you come to have such a creature?"

"Sorrow found me." Arya said honestly. "He brings me scraps sometimes."

"A useful pet indeed! Well then, my youthful new friends, let us away!"

* * *

"Arya's been captured!" Sansa cries.

Clegane had not believed her at first when she had shot awake at dawn, crowing about her most successful warging yet, of the little sister who was _just ahead of them_. They had been riding to catch up with Arya, Gendry and Hot Pie since first light, stopping often for Sansa to check for Sorrow's scratch marks and to get their bearings. With their constant stops, Sansa had taken to shooting from the saddle, and grabbing the arrows on the way past. As she had reached to grab for her latest shot, Sansa had felt Sorrow in the back of her mind _tug_. Suddenly she was with the raven, who was watching her little sister from a distance as a company of men lead by the Red Priest, Thoros of Myr, surrounded the three travellers. Sansa had ever been the most proper of her siblings, but even she could be a wolf when her family needed it, and so had sicked Sorrow on an archer who was threatening her sister.

Sansa told the Hound all of this, even how at the end she had made Sorrow make waste on the archer's face. Sandor Clegane had barked a laugh, and then asked her to keep track of where Arya was being taken. This worked for Sansa, as that was what she wanted to do anyway. Sansa also found that the more she slipped in to Sorrow, the easier it was becoming.

 _"I have to make water!" Arya was being deliberately difficult on the Brotherhood._

 _"I keep telling you, we ain't stopping!" The archer snapped._

 _"But it's my moontime!" Arya whispered, high pitched and embarrassed. "I need to stop!"_

 _The men had all blanched, and Arya had been allowed to slip away with only Sorrow for company._

Aaaaaaryaaaaa! _Sansa called quietly, tugging on a lock of sawn-off hair._

 _"I'm not_ really _on my moonblood," Arya answered obligingly, tugging at her collar to retrieve Sansa's last note. "Men just don't like to talk about it, so it makes a good cover."_

Aah, aah, aah! _Sansa laughed with her sister, before dropping to the ground and sketching a heart out of loose leaves. She waited for Arya to finish the note – a list of foods Sansa wanted to eat once they reached Riverrun – before cawing and tapping at her sketch._

 _Arya's lips wobbled a little, before she whispered, "I love you too. We've started heading westwards a little, but we're still on the road. Be careful, ok?"_

 _Sansa cawed her agreement, and stepped back again._

"There should be an old wall ahead of us," Sansa told Clegane, ruffling her shoulders much as Sorrow would. "We pass through it to the other side, and follow the westwards track. There's Thoros and the archer, and another four men-at-arms besides."

"Good work, girl," Clegane growled, looking at her cautiously. "It's getting easier for you, isn't it?"

"Aye," Sansa nodded, grabbing her arrow and shooting for another tree some ten metres ahead. She hit _exactly_ where she had aimed, and felt a smile bloom fierce and proud across her face. "The more I do it, the more it feels like – like putting on a pair of shoes! If they're a pair that weren't made especially for you, they take some growing in, and the more you wear them, the easier it is to pull them on."

"You had another messenger call while you were with your sister," He says simply, pointing upwards. This raven Sansa actually recognises – it's the one she sent to Robb originally.

 ** _Lady,_**

 ** _They said you were both with the lions. You have sent letters before, sweet sister, that were not your own. I do not know how to trust this letter, either._**

 ** _I hope it to be true._**

It remained unsigned but for a sketched Direwolf.

Sansa growled at this herself, and dug through her saddlebags for the stick of charcoal she had been using to write Arya.

 ** _Grey Wind._**

 ** _Nymeria escaped Harrenhal, captured by the Brotherhood without Banners – they do not yet know her. Moving to rescue her. It is wise to be cautious, but don't be a shift, otherwise I will have Sorrow and Mirth make_** ** _another_** ** _mess on you!_**

 ** _Lady_**

"What's got you scowling?" Clegane asks curiously.

"My sister does not believe me, my brother does not believe me," Sansa hissed. She glared at the bird, and said, "Please let me in."

Warging this raven was different to warging Sorrow. The female felt far more mischievous to Sansa's other senses, and far more open to suggestions from a human. _Good_ , Sansa thought. She looked through the raven's eyes to see that her own had gone white and rolled to the back of her head. Clegane watched her worriedly. _Mirth,_ Sansa whispered to her new bird. _Could you please take this letter back to my brother?_ Conjuring a picture of Robb in their shared mindscape, Sansa asked, _And when you see him, I want you to make waste on his_ face _._

Ravens don't understand the term _make waste_ , but they do understand the imagery of it. Mirth seemed thrilled at the idea, and was more than happy to fly over to Mercy. Sansa stepped back from the bird and in to her own body, and attached the scroll to the raven's foot.

"Fly swiftly, and safely." Sansa instructed. Mirth cawed at her, and took off.

"What did you do, girl?" Clegane asked.

"I told Mirth where to make her next mess," Sansa hissed back, turning Mercy towards her last shot, and then onwards.

"You used your Northern magick to shit on your King brother?!" He exclaimed, before howling with laughter. When he calmed down, he asked, "Mirth?"

" _One is for sorrow, two is for mirth; three is a wedding, four is a birth; five is for laughing, six is for crying; seven for sickness, eight for dying; nine is for love, ten is a kiss; eleven's a secret, and twelve grants a wish_." Sansa recited.

"You gonna collect them all?" Clegane asks, still in good humour.

"Mayhaps. We'll concentrate on finding Arya for now. Let's go – this way."

* * *

Arya had mostly behaved for the Brotherhood the whole of their march to a wayside inn, although she had begged another "break" due to her "moonblood" just before they reached the building. She had sent directions off with Sorrow, and hoped that her sister wasn't _too_ much further off.

The Brotherhood had settled in to the inn well enough, though that Anguy bloke had taken a small company of men and gone off to hunt for the inn as recompense, or something. Gendry, Hot Pie and then Arya had slid in to a bench opposite Thoros and another two men, and had been given their promised bread and stew. Thoros was mourning the size of his alehorn, and trying to have the three of them partake as well. He did not seem fond of Arya's refusal, but did not force her to drink as another might have.

"Now, how did three children – "

"We're not children," She corrected quickly. After what they had seen at Harrenhal, and all that they had done since leaving Kings Landing, not a one of them could be called that, no matter how old Thoros was.

Without skipping a beat, the ginger continued as though she had not interrupted him. "How did three _young persons_ such as yourselves, untrained in the art of war, escape from Harrenhal?"

She looks to the boys to make sure they are paying attention to the half-truths she is going to spin, and then speaks. "Gendry's a smith. He was apprentice in the armoury."

"A smith, ey? Where'd you train?"

Gendry is not as good at lying as Arya, and so he answers honestly. "Kings Landing. Tobho Mott's shop."

"That criminal?" Thoros scoffs. Arya is looking though, and she can see _something_ in his eyes – he is baiting Gendry, to see if what they say is true. "He charges twice as much as every armourer in the city!"

"That's because he's twice as _good_." Even now, Gendry is proud of his former Master, and the old man's work.

"Aha! A smith _and_ a salesman."

With that fact verified, Arya continues her tale. "Gendry stole us weapons."

"Aah. Fought your way out of Harrenhal I see." Thoros is humouring her, she knows. He's baiting, and wants a reaction – Sansa isn't far away. She has backup, if she needs it.

"He knows how to use a sword," Arya tells them coldly, proudly – she had been training the boys around the campfire at night, teaching them all Syrio had once taught her. "And so do I."

The men laugh, and something ugly rears its head inside of Arya. "My brothers taught me," another half-truth, for Robb and Jon had often shown her how to swing a sword at play as children, and Bran and baby Rickon had used her to help practice too. But this just makes the men laugh more, and that prickly, helpless rage is filling her up near to bursting, and Arya stands and draws her sword in challenge. Thoros is drunk and unarmed, and she has her stolen sword beneath his chin.

He moves his arm as though to brush her sword away with his alehorn, but he stands and draws his sword in a spectacular display of speed instead, to raucous laughter. In one move he has her retreating and disarmed, and in another he is showing off with a flowery spin and a flourishing twirl of his sword. If she weren't so mad, she'd be impressed. Behind her there is the thundering hooves of approaching horses, which Thoros ignores to offer a mock-toast to her brothers.

Perhaps he shouldn't have ignored them. A dappled grey mare digs its heels in and skidds to a stop in front of the door – where Sorrow has been watching for who-knows-how-long – and a rider in a long grey cloak slips to the ground, bow drawn back and fury flashing in bright blue eyes.

It was a furious Sansa in the doorway.

* * *

" _Get_ _away from my sister!_ " Sansa snarls, as wild in her fury as any of her siblings or their direwolves. "Sorrow!" The raven puffs up impressively, and darts from the doorway to Arya's shoulders.

"Sansa?!" Arya chokes out, bug eyes fixed on the drawn bow in her big sister's hand.

"So the dangerous girl has a dangerous sister?" An unkept ginger man in red mail questions. He sounds drunk already, and it isn't even noon yet.

"Thoros of Myr," Sansa says, an acknowledgement to the man in front of her, a warning for the man behind her. She hadn't given Sandor any warning before she was kicking Mercy into a gallop – she had seen her sister held at sword point through Sorrow's eyes, and had been overcome with such rage that she hadn't thought, only acted. "Let them go."

"I'm usually rather good at remembering pretty girls," the Red Priest slurs, "But I'm afraid I just can't place you, though I'm sure it would have been a _very_ memorable night for _you_." There is a round of laughter from the men in the inn, and then Sansa can feel Sandor's presence at her shoulder, large and menacing.

Sansa gives the priest an ice-edged smile, fury still licking through her veins. "It was. I had never seen so great a ball as that thrown for the Hand's Turney. And I had been crowned the Queen of Love and Beauty, which was something straight out of the songs for me. I thought it was magnificent."

Gingers are naturally pale, Sansa knows, and yet she can see the moment Thoros figures out who she is, for all the blood in his flushed face drains away.

"Sansa Stark," He whispers. His eyes cut to Arya, and blow even wider. "The missing princess!"

"We're not so missing anymore," Sansa tells him primly. "Our brother, his grace, is expecting us. My shield has graciously agreed to escort us to Riverrun, and so your custody of my sister is no longer necessary. Gendry, Hot Pie, come along." The two boys flinch at her voice, and scramble to obey. Arya is still frozen.

"Now hold on!" Thoros begins, but Sansa speaks over him at Sorrow's call.

"Sandor, there's a party of eight led by that archer coming up behind us. Sorrow, with him please. Thank you for your hospitality, my lord, but I'm afraid we must leave. Arya, come on." She sketched a half curtsey without ever dropping her bow or releasing the draw even a little bit, and waits until Arya and her boys are out the door before she retreats herself, kicking the inn door shut before wheeling around to check what sort of a state the outside is in.

Sorrow's warning had come early, so they have seconds before the archer's party arrives. "Arya, boys, you can take Mercy until we find another horse," She tells them, moving quickly to Stranger. "Sandor?" He mounts first, and then tugs Sansa up behind him so that they can fight together without encumbering the other.

Sorrow calls again, but the shorter boy, Hot Pie, is struggling to pull himself up into the saddle. Sansa stretches out her senses, feels the horses of the Brotherhood in the stables behind the inn, and thinks very hard on how to open the stalls.

"Bird," Sandor growls warningly, spinning Stranger with his knees and holding her slumped body with his left hand.

"What have you done to her?!" Arya demands shrilly.

"Little Bird, wake _up_!" Sandor snarls, pulling his sword free.

There is a shout from the approaching party, but with a mental _twang_ , the horses all do as she bid. Escaping their pens, she calls them to her.

 _"NOW!"_

Perhaps a dozen beasts gallop around the side of the building, swinging around Mercy and Stranger and _colliding_ with the approaching party. Sansa _tugs_ at a dun-coloured gelding, and sends him to Arya. "Get on," She tells her sister quickly, spinning back to face the inn and redrawing her bow. "Boys, how fast can you handle?"

"We'll make do, princess," Gendry says grimly. "Set the pace."

With the three children finally atop Mercy and the gelding, Sandor taps his heels to Stranger's withers, and they're off. Sansa releases an arrow in the inn door and swings her bow over her shoulders, one end by her right ear and the other hanging by her left thigh. Like the arrow, their horses are off, and the Brotherhood Without Banners are left behind in a cloud of dust.

* * *

They've left the Kingsroad and travelled westwards. Sansa thinks that Sandor plans to slip them on to the Riverroad, and use that to cross the Trident, and from what she remembers of her geography lessons with Maester Luwin, she finds this a sound plan. Their only obstacle, it seems, will be Arya.

They haven't been travelling as long as Sansa knows Sandor would have preferred when the sheer number of ravens following them forces them off of the track and in to the woods themselves.

"This is starting to get ridiculous," He grumbles, helping her swing down from Stranger.

"This is _useful_ ," Sansa corrects cheerfully, looking at the half-dozen birds surrounding them. "Look, three of these are Westerland houses!"

"Why are you with _him_?" Arya demands from atop the gelding. Alone of her companions, Arya is the only one to still hold her sword. The boys had both dropped theirs to better hold on to Mercy – Hot Pie's had been lost almost immediately, and Gendry's only a few minutes later when Mercy had had to jump a fallen log – and, even more impressive, was that Arya somehow managing to keep her live blade steady enough that she hadn't accidentally cut the gelding.

"Sandor rescued me from Kings Landing," Sansa answers honestly, moving to Mercy's saddlebags to grab her inkset, quill and dagger. "How did you get away?"

"… Yoren from the Nights Watch took me. These two were meant for the Wall, too. The Goldcloaks killed Yoren, and were looking for Gendry. We were captured, and sent to Harrenhal where _his_ ," she jabbed viciously at Sandor, "brother and men were stationed. They were looking for the Brotherhood, and were torturing people with rats to try and find them."

"I have nothing to do with Gregor's crimes, girl," Sandor spat at her.

"Then what about your own?" Arya demanded. "What about my friend Mycah? He was the butcher's son, he was twelve years old and you ran him down and cut him up like a stuck pig!"

"Aye," Sandor said, watching Arya oddly. Sansa glanced up at him past her first letter – _another_ marriage betrothal, could the Westermen do _nothing_ without Lord Tywin's leave?! – and saw that strange look on his face once again. "He was a squealer."

"Sandor," Sansa rebuked softly, refolding that first letter and giving it back to the female who had originally born it. "Thank you, off with you."

"She'll need to learn what the world's like eventually," Sandor grunted. "Can't live a song all the time – how many Starks they got to behead before that gets through your heads?"

"Don't be mean," Sansa scolds, opening the second letter – the Crag, writing to say that the Young Wolf had been to them and, despite the best efforts of the Lady Sybil, the King in the North had not been tempted by the wiles of either herself or her daughters, and had instead taken up with a healer from Essos. "Oh, Robb's married, Arya! Sandor, my sister has never once enjoyed a song that didn't tell of glorious battles, leastaways one about _romance_. And she has a right to be upset that you killed her friend, even if she doesn't seem to care that it was on Joffrey's orders."

Arya seemed to be visibly struggling on which point to follow first, before finally asking, "Who'd he marry? That Frey girl he promised?"

"No – and this makes that first letter make _so much sense_! No, he's married a foreign girl, a healer. She must be something, to make Robb forsake his word, though."

"He didn't want bastards," Arya says simply. "He didn't like how Jon was treated, and didn't want any child of his to be treated the same."

Sansa flushes pink at that statement, at the knowledge of what _that_ meant, before coughing and putting the second letter away. "Well! Hopefully that means we shall soon have nieces and nephews to spoil!"

"That _would_ be what you concentrated on," Arya huffs crankily.

"'Scuse me, princess," Gendry offers timidly. "But, what are you doing?"

Sansa smiles at him prettily. "Sansa is fine, thank you, Gendry. You too, Hot Pie. I'm trying to make it so that my worth to Robb is greater as a person than as a bargaining chip. I'm currently acting as his Mistress of Whispers – I've warged all these ravens to me, so that I might see the correspondence before anyone else does. I've already collected quite a bit of information for him, so I hope that this will do."

"What're you doing sending it back then?" Hot Pie questions.

"So that the nobles aren't suspicious," Sansa says cheerfully. "This way th – Sandor!"

The third letter was about him, orders from Lord Kevan Lannister to the Mountain That Rides to bring his brother – the craven who had run from the Blackwater with the King's own betrothed – in for justice. Sansa held it out to her shield, eyes wide with worry. The large man took the letter, and gave a sad sounding laugh. "Took them long enough. Well, this is all the prompting _he'll_ need. Best get you both to your brother soonish, then, else you won't have any protection at all bar for your birds."

"Sandor," Sansa begins.

"Never you mind, Bird. You read those last three letters, and then we'll keep on till the Trident."

"But Sandor –!"

"Bird, just keep at it!"

Sansa felt her lips wobble, the tell-tale burn at the back of her eyes. "Arya?" She called back to her wayward little sister. "Do you remember Maester Luwin's trick for the wax?"

"Aye?"

"Could you finish this one and give it back to that raven, please? I just – I need a moment, I'll be right back."

She tells herself that she just needs to make water and change her padding, and she'll be fine – but Sansa was in Kings Landing long enough to pick out lies. She's no Hound to sniff them out, but she is a Wolf, and, she'd like to think, a wily one yet.

She takes what time she has recovering her composure, and tries _not_ to think that her shield's – her _friend's_ – brother has just been given the go-ahead to become a kinkiller.

"Arya?" She asks once she returned.

"I've done it," Her sister replies petulantly. "What took you so long?"

That fury she had felt earlier – that trickle of wolfsblood – is still tickling the back of her mind, and suddenly she wishes to shock her little sister. With another sharp-edged smile, she answers. "Just because you were lying earlier, does not mean that I am."

Arya takes a moment to parse that out, and then blushes as bright as Sansa's own hair. Embarrassed into quiet, Sansa turns from her sister and back to her ravens. A request for more men-at-arms for the Wall, a query over the price of wine from the Arbour, and another marriage contract between two Crownland houses; once the birds are in the air, they are ready to leave.

The two boys are atop Mercy once again, Arya with her gelding – recently named Wolverine – and Sansa behind Sandor on Stranger. Sandor wants to reach the Trident by sundown, so they have a large chunk of land to cover in order to reach this goal. It's hard riding. Sansa hopes that the boys will be able to handle Sandor's exacting pace. If they can, then it will only be another week or more before they are reunited with Robb and Mother.

* * *

It is late in to the night when they finally make camp. Sandor had pushed them _hard_ , harder than he had so far dared to with Sansa, and it had been an uncomfortable experience for all involved. Sansa once again resolved to _never_ ride on her moonblood again if she could help it, but it finally seemed as if the messy process was coming to a close, thank all the gods. Arya had so far not said anything about having to ride so hard nor far without a saddle, and Sansa is grateful that her sister is at least in breeches – she cannot imagine how much more uncomfortable the experience would be if Arya was dressed in skirts, as she is!

Their camp that night is a clearing that Sorrow had told her of earlier in the day, three hundred metres off of both the road and the river, and tucked amongst a dense thicket of trees that make it difficult to see anything, let alone their ragtag group of travellers.

Sandor helps Sansa off Stranger once more and sets about removing the black stallion's tack, and Sansa heads over to the boys to help them off, as well. Arya moves as though to strip Mercy for her, but Sansa has her tend to her friends instead. Neither looks as though they've particularly enjoyed today's experience, either.

The beasts are watered, rubbed down and then tied to low-hanging branches to graze, and the humans have a quick drink and a nibble on the last of the cheese, before finding places to sleep. Hot Pie and Gendry both collapse under one of the trees on the other side of the glade to Sandor and the horses, and Sandor merely heaves his bedroll to Arya, wraps himself in his cloak, and for all intents and purposes appears to pass out beneath the tree he'd tied Stranger to.

Sansa places Sorrow atop of Mercy, and lays her own bedroll down by the two creatures. Arya watches her, grey eyes gleaming in the dark like a wolf.

"Would you bunk by me?" Sansa askes her in a whisper, desperate to have her sister close, and terrified of frightening her away. "Just for tonight!"

Warily, Arya slips over to her and spreads Sandor's roll beside Sansa's own. "How did you escape?" She asks. Going by her bloody bottom lip, Sansa supposes that this question has been plaguing her little sister since their first raven scroll.

"Sandor saved me," Sansa said softly. Arya starts, and gives her a betrayed look. "He did. He was the only one to show me any decency or kindness in that vipers nest."

"That wasn't kindness, Bird," Sandor growls lowly, shocking Arya and amusing Sansa. She's learnt her lesson since that first night – if Sandor isn't snoring, she knows that he is faking at being asleep.

"Then I must have imagined the kerchief on the wall, the cloak in court, and the sword from Flea Bottom," Sansa muses. She's watching, so she sees the colour that blooms in his cheeks, the way that he averts his eyes, and how he ruffles himself inside of his cloak.

"Go to bed, Little Bird," he growls instead. There is no heat to the tone, and so Sansa knows that he doesn't say it cruelly, merely only to cover his embarrassment. "You too, wolf-girl. We'll be riding hard again tomorrow."

With his piece said, he rolls over once again.

Sansa shakes her head, amused, and then pats the bedroll next to her invitingly. "Come on," She says encouragingly. "He's right."

That brings a snarl to Arya's lips. "He still killed my friend!"

"His prince and liege had ordered it of him," Sansa scolds. "And besides that, a smallfolk boy was hitting a highborn girl with a stick. Of course that was the end result! We were in the South, Arya, not the North, things were – _are_ – different! Haven't you figured that out yet?!"

She's shocked her sister again – oops.

"I'm sorry," she whispers. "It's been a long day. I didn't mean to snap. Let's just go to sleep."

Arya shifts awkwardly. "I can't."

"Then, let me tell you a story to put you to sleep, like the old days. How about my first warg dream?" She whispers, reaching out a hand to hold her little sister's. "I was a dog. His name was Oi Dog – he was old, and had a family of humans to protect. One of them was a little girl who looked a bit like you, called _Aya_. I was so sad, thinking that I'd never see you again, that I left the dream early."

"Was this in Kings Landing?" Arya whispered back.

"No, this was our first night on the road – I'd been thinking about Jon, and how terrible I had been to him at Winterfell. I dreamt he was beyond the Wall, in a Wildling camp. Jon and their King were talking about, about the _walking dead_. I couldn't understand half of what was being said, it didn't make sense to me."

"He's alive?" Breathed her little sister, hopeful.

"Aye, and North."

"Can you do it again? Can you dream him, like you found me?"

"… I can only try. Don't wake me until the morning, though, it's harder to stay in the dreams if I'm distracted."

"But you did fine with Sorrow."

"I know Sorrow. He's easy for me to find, and he can call me to him. But, Arya – I think that you can do this too. And I bet if you call to Nymeria, you can find her in your dreams, as well."

Arya's eyes popped wide open in shock. "Do you really think so?" She breathed.

"Call for Nymeria, and I'll see if I can find Jon again."

"How?"

"Think about her very hard – what she looked like, how she smelt, how she moved, how she sounded. Think of all of it, as hard as you can for as long as you can."

Arya nodded

Sansa drew a deep breath, closed her eyes, and thought very hard on her bastard brother and North of the Wall. She could feel the moment she warged in to a blackbird – the last thing her human ears heard, however, was Arya whispering a list to herself.

" _Joffrey. Cersei. Ilyn Payne. Ser Meryn. Polliver. The Mountain ... The Hound._ _Valar Morghulis._ "

It is her months of captivity in Kings Landing that help Sansa reign in her emotions enough to hold on to the dream. She cannot afford to dwell on her sister right now – she needs to find their brother. Luckily enough, he is seated right beneath the raven with a red-headed woman.

 _Aar, aar!_ She calls down to him, fluttering to the ground.

The woman snorts. "This one thinks yer pretty too, Jon Snow!"

Sansa cocks her head at that – aye, she can admit that Jon is good-looking in the same way that she could say that Father or Robb were handsome, but she would never call her brother – _any_ of them – pretty! So she ruffles her feathers, and looks about her with interest. It seems as though Jon is still with the Wildlings, and, worryingly, he does not appear to be a prisoner. Despite the lies Sansa had parroted in Kings Landing, she knows that her father was no traitor, and that none of his children would betray any oaths they'd sworn, so … _Something to think about later_ , she thinks firmly.

Shaking her head to clear her grim thoughts, Sansa looked about at the fresh, powdery snow beneath the raven's feet, and had an idea. She cannot talk to Jon as she had with Arya – _Jon_ was hardly an easy word for a raven's vocals, and she didn't want to know what sort of reaction she'd get if she randomly started saying her or Arya's names, either. But she could recreate what she had done with Arya when Sorrow first helped the sisters meet again, and thus set about using this new bird's beak to write in the snow.

It wasn't as easy as the soil of the forest, and the bird itself wasn't near half as cooperative as either Sorrow or Mirth, but she still managed to scribe out a passable, if shakey, _BROTHER_.

Jon had gone very still when she looked at him expectantly, and the woman was watching with wide blue eyes, too.

"Wha's it say?" The girl asked curiously. When Jon told her, she said in a very quiet voice, "How can you not know what a warg is, if your brother is one?"

"None of my siblings are wargs though…" Jon whispered. Sansa gave a raven's _arr, arr, arr!_ laugh, and then drew a big S.

" _Sansa?!_ " Jon looked as though the next big breeze might blow him over, he was so shocked.

She hissed at him, ruffled her feathers, and then wrote _WOLFSBLOOD_.

"Sansa's an odd name for a boy," the girl says judgingly. "But I suppose that's Southerners. I'm Ygritte." Sansa dips the bird in the closest approximation of a curtsy she can manage.

"My oldest little sister," Jon corrects somewhat faintly.

 _hissssSaaaanssaaaa Sss-aaar_ , she tries.

"Sansa Stark?" Ygritte questions. Sansa nods. "Nice to meet you! Have you always bin a warg?" A headshake. "Well, I had to check. Your brother knows nothin', so he could have missed it before he went off to be a Crow."

Sansa looks at the body she is currently wearing, Ygritte, her brother, and then back to the Wildling woman.

"Watcher on the Wall. We call 'em Crows up here, in the _real_ North."

The way she emphasized _real North_ seems like a recurring argument between her and Jon, and it's not as though this crow can help carry across Sansa's words anyway, so she lets it slide, and instead pecks at Ygritte's bow. Sansa's pretty sure it's made out of Weirwood, and even though it is twice the size of her own bow, as far as she is concerned, it is beautiful.

"An archer, are you!" Ygritte exclaims cheerfully (Jon chokes). "Are you any good."

Sansa shakes her head, and sketches out _BEGINNER_.

"She says she's a beginner," Jon translates. "But I – forgive me, Sansa, but it's a bit hard to imagine you with a bow. Or as a warg."

Sansa puffs herself up at that and hisses ferociously. _NO ONE BELIEVES_ , she carves in to the snow, making fuss the whole time. _R & A SAME._

"You've written to Robb and Arya?" Jon asks quickly, looking for an end to the brewing argument. She draws an R and a wonky scroll, and then an A with two stick figures. "You've written Robb, and you're with Arya? Are you still in Kings Landing?" She nods to the first statement, and shakes her head to the second. She half-flies a little.

"You flew away – you escaped?" Ygritte asks. At Sansa's nod, the redhead turns to Jon and says, "I like the sound of this sister, alright! We have to go back to camp now though – are you ok to break your warg on your own, Sansa Stark? Beginners usually have trouble."

Sansa shakes her head quickly, and does another avian curtsy. She turns to Jon, draws a heart, and taps it twice. Her half-brother looks as though he's about to cry. "I love you too, Sansa – and Arya and Robb and Bran and Rickon too! Tell them for me, please?"

She cannot bear to tell Jon that their baby brothers are dead – not like this. So she gives him a sharp nod, taps the heart again, and leaves the raven and Beyond the Wall.

Hopefully Arya's warging is going better than hers.

* * *

Arya only feels a little bit like a monster for keeping her sister's shield on her Prayer, but he did still kill her friend, so she decides that he can stay there until he proves that he deserves to live. With her prayer said, however, she can now attempt to try this warging thing. Sansa had said to concentrate on Nymeria, and Arya felt that it couldn't be all that hard – she dreamt of a wolfpack every night. With very little effort at all, Arya feels herself slipping away, the scents of the forest filling her nose, churning earth beneath the pads of her paws, the dull half-lights of the moon shining bright as day to her now-advanced eyes.

 _Nymeria?_ She thinks, somewhat desperately.

The impression that comes back to her is bright – the love her wolf had felt for the daughter of Winterfell permeated everything, and Arya saw herself with long hair and the long dress in the Northern style that she had once tolerated, a shock of scent attached to the pulse that Arya realised was what she had once smelt like to Nymeria. _Where_ , says her wolf. _Safe?_

 _Almost,_ Arya thinks. _With pack_ , and sends an image of Sansa, all red hair and pretty smells.

Nymeria's head is quiet whilst she inspects the image of this new, armed Sansa she has been sent, and approvingly sends back, _Grew fangs. Little Sister would be proud_.

For a moment both girl and wolf are silent, sadness rebounding from one side of the link to the other as they remember Lady.

 _Where are you_? Arya finally asks.

Nymeria's response is a confusing tangle of scents, sounds and distances, with a few scattered landmarks that only vaguely made sense to Arya. The girl tried to return the impression, but a human's nose was nowhere near as good as a wolfs, no matter how much wolfsblood that human possessed.

 _Don't worry_ , Nymeria sent softly. _I will find you. I'll bring_ my _pack, and we will find the Older Brother together, and fight off the enemy pack!_ This brought forth the impressions of Grey Wind and Robb, and then of the Lannisters.

The girl sent her wolf the impression of a bare-toothed smile – a hungry, angry wolf smile.

 _How soon?_

Wolves can't count. Not really, not in the sense that humans do. But they can count _time_ in regards to the phase of the moon. The current phase was a half moon, and Nymeria expected it to be sometime between the new moon and the first crescent, so long as her pack experienced no set-backs, and so long as Arya's human pack continued moving steadily North. Otherwise, it was likely to not be until the next half-moon before they were able to meet up again.

Another brightness welled up in Arya's chest – hope.

Her wolf was coming for her. She was moving towards her brother and mother. Her sister was, for now, safe, and had seemingly given up on being a traditional lady. Things were looking up in the world!

* * *

 _Arya, Robb, and now Jon. Not a one of them believed me_.

When Sansa awoke from her warg dream, it was the hour of the nightingale and she was furious.

True, of all of Ned Stark's children, Sansa was the most Southern. True, she had rejected those activities which Septa Mordane had labelled as unladylike, or unbecoming for future suitors. True, she had never desired to hold a weapon, let alone wield one. True, she of all her siblings was least associated with the North.

That did not make her _weak_. That did not make her _incapable_. That did not mean she could not _learn_. Joffrey and the court may have called her stupid, but none of _them_ had had cause to learn the bow in just over a week – in fact, Joffrey was notorious terrible with arms! _He_ had never figured out ancient magicks, _he_ wouldn't know how to handle spycraft if it, if it bit him in the rear!

As quietly as she could, Sansa rose and grabbed her bow, figuring she may as well see if she couldn't replenish their meat supplies. Sorrow had spotted many fat Riverland rabbits yesterday, and maybe she could finally claim that "first kill" that Sandor had been waxing about. She hadn't gone far when her little sister rolled over in her sleep, growling like a wolf. Her eyes were just barely slitted open, and were warg white. As much as Sansa was the Proper Southern Maid, her sister was, if not _Proper_ , then certainly a _desirable_ Northern one. She had picked up the dream warging even easier than Sansa had.

Sansa's rage grew. _Arya_ hadn't learnt the bow in a week – she had taken months. _Arya_ hadn't survived Joffrey's tortures, Kings Landing's scorn. Arya had been running wild like the little wolfchild she was, and Sansa had lied lied lied her way into the shadows and out of obvious sight.

Sandor was snoring, so it was safe to tiptoe past him. Here, now, she is so much more than Kings Landing made her out to be. She steps into the shadows of the forest and out of the terrible darkness of the court, and she was safe and more free then she had been since they first left Winterfell.

She gave Mercy a pet on her way past, but otherwise paid the others no mind, excepting Sandor's sharp ears. She was in no mood to handle his prickliness, on top of her own.

Sorrow drew his head from beneath his wing, and hopped his way up Mercy's back, and then on to Sansa's shoulder. She gave him a grudging smile, and together they slunk into the forest.

She was still mad, ire licking through her blood like a fire, but having to concentrate on moving quietly through the dim lit forest helped to focus the rage. Sorrow would occasionally drag her into his own head to offer insights to her, such as how to move more steadily or quietly, and where to draw her eyes to look for signs of prey. They travelled closer to the river-side of the woods, slowing and stepping even more quietly in an attempt to narrow in on the just-stirring rabbits. On her own, perhaps she wouldn't have accounted for the wind and the superior noses of the forest animals, so she was thankful to Sorrow. It took a few tries to make her bow movements quiet enough to go undetected by the bunnies, but by the time she had seen fifteen rabbits, Sansa had been successful enough to catch three. She tried not to let the numbers discourage her, and decided to take the carcases back to the camp so that they might treat it for breakfast (she desperately hoped that three rabbits would be enough between the six of them, and yet knew her folly for what it was. Arya alone could have eaten a whole rabbit, she was sure, let alone a giant of a man and two growing boys).

Making her quiet careful way back to the camp, Sansa was glad to find her wrath had simmered to smouldering embers. So long as she was concentrating on something else, her head yet remained clear. To this effect she was constructing lists in her head: what she would need for breakfast, how many provisions they had left, how far it was to Riverrun, how long it would take, how best to deal with Petyr Baelish. This kept her in relatively good humours, such that she was able to ghost in and out of the camp to deposit the rabbits, gather firewood, and fill a pail with water from the Trident. Sandor had taught her how to build the fire, and where he kept the flint. Shae's dagger she used for the steel, and she is surprised that Sandor is still snoring. Oh well.

Arya and her boys still sleep, too, but Sansa's still mad at her sister, so she is glad of that. Her next issue is the actual _skinning_ of the beasts – she has never done this herself. For a moment, she is tempted to warg that raven Beyond the Wall and ask Jon to help her (even if she's mad with him, she also knows that he can never say no to any of their siblings if they only ask it of him – and besides, Ygritte is a Wildling and she likes Sansa, so, that's something). She knows the folly of such an idea; it's not as though she can have such an extensive conversation when Ygritte can't read, and that bird hadn't been fond of writing.

Shae's dagger is much smaller than Sandor's skinning knife, but that is fine, since Sansa is so much smaller than Sandor herself.

"Little Bird?" Sandor calls softly, sounding confused. "What is this?"

Sansa looks up at him, surprised.

"What are you doing?" Arya pipes, also awake and also confused, and at the combined doubt, Sansa's anger returns in full.

"Breakfast," She spat, wrenching her arrow from the first fat creature with unnecessary force. "Or is that unbelievable of me now too?"

Gendry and Hot Pie both shrink back against their tree, Arya stares, and Sandor moved forward slowly, as if dealing with a cornered animal.

"No, Bird, you've come a long way in a sennight. Let me show you how to skin it."

" _What?!_ " Three young voices practically screeched the question, almost cutting off Sandor's second sentence.

"You learnt all tha' in _seven days_?!" Hot Pie exclaimed first, whilst Arya choked and Gendry tried to pick his jaw back up off the ground.

"Bow…?" Arya croaked, pointing to the arrow-stuck bunnies.

"The, the magicks?" Gendry added.

Unfortunately, this destroyed any headway Sandor might have made towards calming her, as, with a sound rather like a boiling teakettle and (no doubt) a face just as red, Sansa turned around and stormed off into the forest.

"Sorrow!" Her voice echoed off of the trees, harsh as the raven's answering caw. " _Waste!_ "

 _Aar, aar, aar!_

Sorrow wheeled over the three youths, cackling delightedly. A set each of grey, blue and hazel eyes looked up, and regretted it. Much as with Anguy the day before, Sorrow released his bowels thrice upon the upturned faces before taking after his mistress.

* * *

Arya was furious.

Precious Sansa had surprised her by catching fat rabbits for breakfast, starting a fire and setting a pail of water to boil when they had awoken that morning. And all any of them had done was be surprised – for Arya had told Gendry and Hot Pie stories of her Proper Southern Lady sister – and she had had Sorrow _shit on their faces!_

Stupid Sansa. The Hound had gone after her in the woods, calling her _Little Bird_ and _apologising_ and acting almost like a real knight from the stories! He spent ages trying to track her down, so it had fallen to Arya and the boys to start breakfast. Hot Pie had wanted to make a stew, but it would have taken too long, and they didn't have a way to save the left overs, so they'd attempted to cook strips of rabbit meat instead. _Sansa_ hadn't thought to pick any of the nuts or berries that were surely growing in these woods. _Sansa_ hadn't even looked twice at the wild herbs that grew around their little campsite. Sansa hadn't had to escape on her own, or pretend to be a boy, or forget how to be a Stark.

By the time Sansa had been calmed down enough to return, she had refused to look at anyone who wasn't her precious shield or an animal. They had eaten in silence, destroyed any evidence of their camp, mounted, and followed the Trident until it became the Red Fork

As they ride (the boys atop Sansa's Mercy, Arya on her Wolverine, and Sansa behind the stupid Hound), Sansa practices stringing, drawing and unstringing her bow, again and again and again. She does not fire a single arrow until they finally stop for lunch, at which point she looses a half-hundred, builds a small fire and accepts ravenscrolls from the three new birds who had been following them. She eats almost nothing (Sorrow had brought her small bunches of berries intermittently), and refuses to talk to anyone.

It eats at Arya. She had been so hopeful this morning, after her wolf-dream, and even if her friend's murderer was here, he had kept her sister safe, and hadn't been terrible to Arya, like his brother had been. He hadn't said much of anything to any of them, actually, since breakfast.

She wants to demand of her sister, to know if she found Jon, if he is safe, and why was Sansa so mad anyway? Arya had burst in to _tears_ when they first reunited, and Sansa was a _fucking_ _bird_ , so how is Arya supposed to know if Sansa had cried too?! Arya _knew_ she hadn't been happy to have her back after all! She was too dirty and ragged and wild for precious Sansa, why the fuck did she even bother, and – !

"Girl," The Hound growls at her. She snarls back at him, but he continues. "I can hear you thinking from here. Just spit it out, and stop staring at us like that."

"Why're you so mad at me?!" Arya demands of her sister. "Did you not want to find me after all?"

"What?! No!" Sansa turns around quickly, nearly slipping off of Stranger in the process. "Arya, from the moment I thought you were ahead of us, I've wanted nothing so much as to find you – I intercepted a raven telling Lord Tywin that all of the smallfolk at Harrenhal had been executed, and it was all Sandor could do to get me to move until Sorrow brought me your first letter. I was mad because neither you nor Robb nor Jon thought that I was capable." Sansa swallowed, and fished a letter from her sleeve, which Sorrow flew to Arya to read for herself. "I found Jon last night, and he was so shocked that _I_ was a warg and an archer than he almost fell over. Not a one of you had faith in me."

Arya read Robb's message quickly, and looked back up at Sansa, chewing on her already raw bottom lip. "It's not _that_ ," She began hesitatingly.

"But it is!" Sansa exclaimed. "You all thought that I would stay locked away and undependable in Kings Landing, a prisoner and a puppet. Didn't you?"

Arya stays quiet.

"It wasn't just that I was mad at the world for saying that that is the ideal noble woman," Sansa whispers. "I was hurt that all of you thought so little of me."

"You're cleverer than the boys, usually," Arya offered. "But, you kept saying how in love you were with Joffrey!"

"Because I thought I was _supposed to be_ , Arya!" Sansa exclaims. "I thought that the greatest thing I could do was marry the prince, who was _supposed_ to be chivalrous and honourable and handsome and _good_ , and give him lots of babies – that's what we're _supposed to want!_ Why do you think I've been trying so hard to grow since we escaped? If I can prove my worth to Robb is greater as a whisperwoman than as a bargaining chip, then I don't have to pretend that that's what I want, or that I love whatever man he tells me to marry for politics, or roll over and let some stranger take me. Don't you _get it_?!"

There are tears gathering in the corners of her big sister's eyes, and Arya finds matching ones growing in her own eyes, too.

"Why didn't you just say so?" Arya mumbles, scrubbing at her face. "I thought you hated me."

With a choked noise, Sansa slips from Stranger and then swings herself up onto Wolverine. She clutches Arya to her tightly, tears slipping into Arya's ratnest hairdo and dripping from Arya's nose.

"You make me so mad sometimes! But you are my little sister. I can't hate you, Arya Stark." With a sniffle, Sansa pulls back and turns Arya's face to her own. "The lone wolf dies, but the pack _survives_. We are going to get back to Robb and Mother, and we are going to win this war and find Jon and retake Winterfell! Ok?"

A wobbly smile finds its way on to Arya's face. "OK!"

* * *

They had been travelling for another few hours when Mirth tugs at the edges of her mind, drawing Sansa away from another petty argument between her sister and her shield. The scene Mirth shows her is a funeral, on what looked to be one of the Forks. Mirth shows her Robb and Mother, shows her a man who looks like her Tully-faced brothers armed with a bow, and an older man in scaled armour with greying red hair. There is a boat floating down the river, packed with grasses and containers, decked with the Tully flag and a stone-eyed body of an even older man, thin with sickness and in death. There's an open brazier burning by the man who must be her uncle, and together she and Mirth watch as he lights an arrow and looses it – it misses.

 _Didn't want to get hit_ , Mirth thinks to her brightly. _Never know_ where _this one is aiming._

 _You know him?_

Mirth offers her memories, countless scenes of the man before her – her Uncle Edmure? – trying and failing to hit thousands of targets. Edmure takes three shots at her grandfather's funeral boat, and thrice misses. Robb's head is ducked to hide his amusement. The older warrior finally tires of watching Edmure, and so steps up, takes the bow and a single arrow, fires, and then stalks away. Behind him, the arrow sets the pyre alight, and the boat passes around a bend in the river. Sansa is suitably impressed.

The gathered household tags alone on the older gentlemen's coattails, and Mother, Robb and a dark-skinned woman who must be his new wife, and Uncle Edmure all remain at the peer.

"At least he is at peace now," Mother murmurs, bowing her head in prayer. Robb puts his hand on her shoulder, his blue eyes skipping around the scene.

 _Now!_ Mirth cackles. _Fun fun fun!_

The female lands in front of the King of the North, flicking her tail cheekily and giving a raven laugh.

 _Arr arrr arrr!_

She pulls the scroll from her foot, and holds it out to Robb expectantly.

"Is it your sister again?" The woman asks curiously.

"Aye, I think – Mother, read this for me? I think it might _actually_ be Sansa!"

"'Don't be a shift'?" Her good-sister askes.

"Whenever Arya was mad at Sansa, she'd cut a hole in Sansa's mattress and stuff sheep dung inside," Robb recalled fondly. "They called it _sheep shift_ , because Father didn't tolerate swearing in front of his girls. But, what I want to know is who Sorrow and Mirth are?"

 _Aar aar arr,_ Mirth called, before flicking down in to a raven's curtsy.

Her goodsister crouched down by mirth, and looked in to dew-bright eyes. "Who are you?"

"It's a _bird_ , Talisa, it's not going to –" Uncle Edmure begins.

 _hissssSaaaanssaaaa Sss-aaar_!

"What?" Mother and Robb whisper, both white-faced.

Mirth gives a throaty laugh and takes to the air. She circles the peer once, swoops over Robb, and shits on his face.

Riverrun echoes with raven laughter and man's curses, and Sansa feels her spirits lift even more.

* * *

 **I love the dynamic between the Stark girls, and I really hate how often people will set them against each other or bash each other. My little sister and I are both incredibly different creatures, and are six years apart. We fight all the time – a _lot_ more, and more viciously, as children – but that doesn't mean we don't love each other or would literally do anything for each other, even when we're furious with the other. I've tried to show that here, and I hope I've done them justice, though as ever, I really appreciate any criticisms and constructive feedback. Also, I recently started watching Inuyasha, so you might notice some of that influence in this chapter too… oops ^_^"what**


	3. Chapter 3 Poor Unfortunate Souls

**Chapter Three. Poor Unfortunate Souls (In pain, in need)**

 **Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews on the last chapter! However, I'm not really sure how to take all of the questions about whether I had abandoned** Kings **,** Sisters **and** Arya the Unlikely **, and am trying to remain positive that everyone is enjoying my writing. If I don't touch my fics for more than twelve months, ok, asking about abandonment is a valid question. If I updated the week/month before, please just assume that I'm working on the next chapter – I am a fairly slow updater. I work in tourism, and our season just started.**

 **Chapter warning for canon-typical violence and sexism.**

* * *

Sandor had ridden them all hard to try and get them from the Trident to the Inn of the Kneeling Man (food they didn't have to hunt for, beds, and wine – nobody complained once he explained the pace), but even still they had not been able to get there by the time the sun had gone down, and Sandor hadn't wanted to risk the horses in the dark. With two inexperienced riders and one going bareback, it was unwise to push _too_ hard. They were somewhere between the Inn and Castle Stone Hedge, and as long as nothing bad happened, they should get to Riverrun within three days.

Weary and travelworn, the companions had tucked themselves away in a corpse of trees in a similar arrangement to the night before – Sandor against a tree wrapped in his cloak, the boys huddled together in Sandor's bedroll, and the Stark girls in Sansa's, Stranger picketed separate from the other two horses, and Sorrow balanced high on Mercy's neck. All of them fall dead asleep immediately, and the girls don't even dream, they are so tired.

Hours later, it is the screams that wake them. Sansa jerked up and sideways, scrabbling at Shae's dagger, reaching for her bow and tugging at Sorrow's mind, even as her little sister was lurching for her sword, as Sandor looked away grimly and a groggy Gendry and Hot Pie exchanged rapidly-paling looks.

"Rape," Sansa breathed, eyes wide. Gathering all of her courage, she wrapped herself up in her cloak and started the hike off towards the screams.

"Where do you think you're going?" Sandor rasped. "So eager to have that experience again, bird?"

"You saved me last time," Sansa tells him calmly, still walking. "I'm passing the favour forward."

Arya is at her coattails with steps as quiet as Sansa's own; with a sigh Sandor clambers to his feet as well, but he is even quieter than they. He growls at the boys to stay put and belts on his sword as he follows them.

They sneak through the forest, and slowly the scene is known to them. The woman in question is nearly as tall as Sandor, dressed in men's clothes that appear well-made, and tied up in rope that is considerably less so. She is surrounded by three cloaked men, dressed in the Northern style. One of them has the flayed man of House Bolton. They are taunting the woman, encouraging her screams, and Arya suddenly moves faster than Sansa, moves as a wolf going in for the kill, her sword angled to avoid the light but her eyes lit with bloodlust. Sansa has an arrow knocked and is drawing to back her fierce little sister, resolving herself to taking the life of a Northerner, one of Robb's soldiers.

Before anyone can do anything, there is another call from the opposite camp of, _Bring her back here!_

Arya freezes, Sansa stiffens where she is, and Sandor clamps his hand down on Arya's shoulder and mouth.

There's growls and grumbles, but one of the men calls out _Yes m'lord!_ in any case, and they start to take the big woman back towards the fires. Carefully, they track these would-be rapists, following and watching to see what has changed their mind about this woman.

"Bugger me with a poker," Sandor breathes, staring at a bearded man tied to one of the sturdier trees. "It's Jaime fucking Lannister!" Both girls shoot him looks, so he elaborates. "He's supposed to be a prisoner of your brother – supposed to be in a cell at Riverrun, your grandfather's seat. And that woman is Brienne the Beauty, Tarth's Lady Knight. They say she murdered Renly Baratheon and entered your mother's service."

"If we return Robb's most valuable prisoner," Sansa whispers back, "And give Mother back her sworn shield, then that might stop them from trying to force us in to betrothals or marriages! Can we take the company, do you think?"

"Three against fifteen? One of them a tiny little girl, and the other a lady just learning the bow – we don't stand a chance."

"Don't forget me," Gendry's low voice comes to them out of the darkness. "I left Hot Pie with Sorrow and the horses. I'm not a soldier, true, but I'm strong, and I can fight."

"You don't have a sword," Sansa pointed out, eyes flicking back to the campsite.

"I'll steal one from whoever you hit, Lady Stark."

"Against fifteen bloody Boltons, we're still fucked." Sandor contributed darkly before Sansa had a chance to correct the title.

"What if we arm the lady and the Kingslayer?" Arya murmured. "That's six to fifteen, and we have the element of surprise. Sansa, how many can you take out before they react?"

"Three, if I'm quick. But I'll need to keep moving, I'm no good to you in close combat. Any others, I can't guarantee."

Arya nodded. "Take out the three closest to the Lady Knight and her rope if you can, then move. Go and free their horses or something, or shoot from the edges, I don't care, just don't hit us. We'll be the main attacking force until those others can get blades in their hands."

As they had been talking and watching, the Kingslayer had sweettalked his way off of the tree, and was taken a ways away. Sansa took this as an opportunity, and let loose three rapid arrows that all found their marks, a fourth cutting through the Lady's rope at the back. The men kicked up a fuss as Jaime Lannister started screaming fit to wake the dead, though Sansa didn't stop to see what caused the ruckus. She saw her sister, guard and the blacksmith take off, and moved quickly to the sides herself, lining up another shot and taking it. Instead of catching the man in the throat as she had intended, Sansa had rushed her shot and caught the man in the shoulder, and given her position away too.

Swiftly Sansa ducked back the way she had come, loosing another arrow that caught a man in the gut. She raced to the horses, cutting them free with Shae's dagger and stampeding them back through the camp. She took control of some of them, forcing the beasts right in to the men who were trying to take out her friends.

Arya's piping voice cut across the sounds of battle clearly.

"Fuck _off_ , Sansa!"

Sansa grins ferally, and tries to hold her giggles back. She has to focus if they are all to escape unscathed; they cannot leave survivors, it won't do for Roose Bolton to find out that the Stark girls had killed his men. There had been fifteen at the start of the battle – Sansa had shot four, and the horses could account for two of the bodies on the ground. Arya had three deaths to her name, Gendry one, and Sandor had taken out five all on his own. The Lady Knight and the Kingslayer hadn't had to do a thing. This was fortunate, as the Kingslayer was still screaming.

"What's wrong with him?" Sansa demanded, coming out of her hiding spot to get a closer look at the fair knight.

"Don't look, m'lady!" Gendry exclaimed, trying to hold her back.

"Arya?" She snapped, glaring up at the smith.

"They took his hand," Her sister breathed, slinking past Sansa with her sword still bloody.

Sansa paled. "I'll have a look at it," she whispered, slinging her bow over her shoulders numbly. "Pick their pockets for me, Arya? Then build a pyre to dispose of the bodies. Strip them first, see if we can't find a use for anything, or can sell anything at the next hamlet."

Arya gives her an approving look, and drags a green-faced Gendry after her. Sansa turns to the horses who still mill about, warging one of the more intelligent to head back to their original camp to collect Hot Pie (who could in turn bring Stranger, Mercy and Wolverine).

Slipping back in to her own body and drawing in a deep breath, Sansa moves towards the Kingslayer. "Ser Jaime! I need you to calm down!"

The big woman has gone to him as well, her blue eyes wide with horror. The Kingslayer is still screaming, so Sansa looks at Brienne and snaps, "Hold him down for me, please. Arya, is there any wine? Gendry, look for clean linen for me – actually, never mind, boil me some water and tear up some strips of cloth, that will do. Sandor – "

"I'm not getting the other one, Little Bird," he growls at her. "Fat shit won't be any help here, anyway."

Sansa sighs to herself and declines to inform him that that _wasn't_ what she was going to ask. Hitching her shoulders back up, grabbing a water flask and pulling one of her own kerchiefs from her pocket, she moves closer to the bedraggled pair. "Fine, then. Lady Knight, keep him steady for me instead, please. Ser Jaime, I need you to hold very still. Sandor, would you – ?" Her grumpy shield moves before she can even finish, helping Brienne hold down Jaime's arm. "Thank you. Ser Jaime, I'm going to do what I can here, but you need to help me, too."

"Lady Stark, where ever did you come from?" He snarks weakly, head lolling and eyes glassy.

"Hold still, Ser Jaime." Sansa repeats firmly, gently washing around the stump of his arm with the water flask, and then tightly binding the end with her kerchief.

"Well?" He asks arrogantly, head lolling. "Does the Lady Stark know anything about healing?"

"There's no need to be hateful," Sansa scolds absentmindedly. "Gendry, how's that water coming along?"

* * *

"What's your plan now?" Arya grumbles, tearing into a bit of pheasant. Sansa gives her a long-suffering look before answering.

"If we return Robb's most important political prisoner, we have even more sway than before, don't we? We could trade Ser Jaime for peace."

"Good fucking luck," Sandor growls. "Cersei might do it, Tywin probably won't do it, and Joff certainly won't either."

"Well, we're still better off than without a prisoner, aren't we?" Sansa snaps back at him. "Lady Brienne, if we have you deliver him and a note to Robb? We can say that we won't come in until he swears on Father's grave that he won't marry us off without giving us the chance to make our choices first."

"I don't know how well received I'll be, my ladies," Brienne offers slowly, casting frequent looks to the passed-out Lion behind them. "I am your mother's shield, I do not serve your brother."

"It's easy," Arya growled. "Take him to the gates. Tell Mother that we're not in Kings Landing, so she and Robb can keep their prisoner. We'll draft up a letter for Robb to let him know our terms. If you take Sorrow with you, then he can let us know when it's safe to go inside."

"And what about us?" Gendry murmurs lowly.

"You can smith for Robb," Arya answers. "And, Hot Pie, I'll be they'll love another cook!"

As much as Arya might look like Father, she is truly Mother's daughter. Sansa knows people better than even her friendly little sister now, can read the nuances of their thoughts written on their faces, and can see what Arya somehow misses.

"Gendry?" Sansa asks gently. "Is there something else you'd rather do?"

Pink dusts his cheeks, and the tall youth ducks his head. "I am a smith, m'lady," he says lowly. "I'm good at it, too, I like it and I like being useful."

Sansa hummed, Tully eyes flicking over to Arya. "What are you going to do?" She asked. "I'm to be Robb's Master of Whispers. How will you prove your worth past marriage alliances?" Gendry's shoulders tighten, Hot Pie looks sick, and Sansa hopes her sister won't hit her for such a question.

"As a fighter, of course!" Arya says indignantly.

"One little girl still learning her blade, versus the hundreds or thousands of men that her marriage could bring to Robb's cause. Think bigger, Arya."

"Bigger, like the Small Council?" Hot Pie tries.

Sansa smiles at him encouragingly.

Arya counts on her fingers the same list of titles that Sansa had recited to herself only a week earlier. "Hand of the King, Grandmaester, Master of Whispers, Master of Laws, Master of Coin, Master of Ships, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, Lord Commander of the City Watch."

"You can't be a Lord Commander of nothin' Arry," said Hot Pie. "You're still learning. An' you can't be Grandmaester neither, you don't know nothing about healing, and Lady Sansa is gonna be the Whisperman – woman, whisperlady, the Whisper – "

"It's fine," Sansa interjected smoothly.

"Sorry, m'lady; and Arry, your brother has to have a Hand already, so that just leaves Law, Coin and Ships. D'you know anything about any of that?"

Arya is chewing on her lip as though she's fit to bite the whole thing off. "I don't know anything about Ships, which leaves Coin and Laws. I'm good at both of those."

"You're not good at rules," Gendry scoffs. "You break them all the time."

"It's more than just that!" Arya spat back. "It's about administering _justice_ , and managing the chief gaoler and all the under-gaolers, and making sure the right laws of succession are followed, and sorting out inheritances and stuff! I can do all of that, I'm not scared."

"No one is calling you afraid," Sansa corrects, elbowing Sandor before he can open his mouth. "Can you do it? Can you be impartial enough to administer a fair justice? I've heard your prayer. If one of the people on it were brought before you, can you tell me truthfully that you would follow through all of the steps of an unbiased sentencing?"

Arya is quiet, and coupled with the looks the two boys are giving her, it is very telling.

"Think on it," Sansa says softly. "We're close now, closer than either of us has been to Mother or Robb since we left home. Mirth thinks that they'll be at Riverrun for another few days yet, and you said that Nymeria shouldn't be too much further away, either. Let's wait for the pack before we go anywhere, plan, and train. _Then_ we can go to Robb with our ultimatum. Yes?"

She thinks perhaps she ought to be shocked at how easily she orders their company and expects it to be followed, a little bit afraid by Arya's compliance and the lack of judgement from Sandor.

"And the Lion?" Sandor askes instead of questioning her plan.

"I'll write to Talisa, and send the ravens at dawn."

"Very good, my lady," Brienne of Tarth finally says. She is a quiet one, steel-spined and honourable. "And after that?"

Sansa smiles her most charming, winsome smile. "Between yourself, Ser Jaime, and Sandor, I rather though we might work on our martial skills."

Arya's answering smile is vicious and pleased, Gendry's hopeful and Hot Pie merely resigned.

They bid themselves a goodnight, and take up their places around the campfire – Ser Jaime and the Lady Knight, Sandor, Sansa and Arya, and the two boys. They have eleven horses to sell at the neighbouring hamlets and villages, swords that Gendry can touch up for them to keep or sell, and spare clothing to go around. They have food, new bedrolls that might need a wash or two in the river, and most importantly, they have hope.

Things are looking up.

* * *

When Sansa returns from catching a breakfast of rabbits and squirrels in the grey predawn, it is to find Arya dancing around Sandor, moving through the motions of what must be her water dancing, a glum Hot Pie and Gendry going through drills with the lady knight, and the Kingslayer breathing heavily in a fitful doze.

"Is that all you've got, ya little shit?" Sandor growls at Arya, flicking her blade away contemptuously.

With a battle cry that is more fury than intimidation, Arya throws herself back at Sandor, dancing, weaving and even leaping in an attempt to land a hit.

"Lady Sansa!" Brienne calls. "Leave those for the time being; boys, keep at this drill until I return. My Lady, let me see your bow, please."

Bemused, Sansa handed the weapon over and unslung her quiver too.

"My lady, this is too small for your figure," Brienne said worriedly.

"Aye, I am aware, Lady Knight. Unfortunately, I don't know how to make another, and it is the only one I have."

"Certainly there must be someone in one of the neighbouring hamlets who knows how to make a decent bow. We'll have a look when we're selling the horses, my lady, don't worry. Would you shoot for me, please?"

With a polite _of course_ , Sansa obligingly shoots ten arrows rapidly, at various distances.

"Have you been learning the bow long, my lady?"

"I started learning the day after the Blackwater burnt, Lady Knight."

Brienne's eyebrows tick upwards unconsciously, surprise written heavily on her face. Sansa tries not to hold it against the older woman, keeping her face politely neutral.

"You do very well, my lady. If we find you a bow that fits, I expect you would be an archer of great skill before this war is over. However, you will have to continue to practice to achieve such a level. Can you move at all whilst shooting?"

"No, Lady Knight, not yet. I can work on it, however. And, perhaps, would you know how best to shoot from horseback?"

"I'm afraid I only know the basics, my lady, but we can always practice. Have you any other weapons?"

Sansa draws Shae's dagger, and holds it out carefully.

"This is Lorathi metalwork?"

"It was given to me by a dear friend." Sansa says quietly. "I do believe that she was from Lorath, originally. I would… I would like to learn how to use it."

Brienne is nibbling on her bottom lip. "I am… not as proficient in knife-work as I am with the sword. Perhaps the Hound – ?"

"I have asked him already, Lady Knight. I'm afraid he is in the same boat as yourself. That's alright, though, I'm sure if we look around, we shall find someone."

Brienne nods at her, instructs her to shoot another ninety arrows, and then goes back to Gendry and Hot Pie. Arya and Sandor are still screaming at each other, and Sansa can't help but wonder if wild Ygritte doesn't know any knife tricks. She bets that the answer is yes, and resolves to warg the third raven over lunch, barring any complications. Hopefully Talisa will have written a reply by then.

* * *

 _ **Goodsister,**_

 _ **What do you do to an amputated stump? A hand was severed at the wrist; we've washed it with water and bound it with kerchiefs, but are yet concerned. Any advice that you could offer would be greatly appreciated.**_

 _ **Lady and Nymeria**_

Talisa Maegyr stares at the note, looks at the raven that had brought it, and then back to the parchment. It is … likely an unwise course of action, to show the letter to either her husband or his mother. Both are worried enough already after the last letters from Sansa, and Robb was certainly in a temper after Mirth's bit of _fun_.

(If Talisa is honest with herself, which she always tries to be, Robb well deserved the mess yesterday. Really, he should have more faith in his sisters.)

So she decides to wait awhile before speaking of this to Robb and Catelyn, instead drawing up a letter of instructions and another on plant identification for the girls, and sending both away with yesterday's Mirth and today's Sorrow. She cannot do much for her new little sisters, but what she can she will.

At lunchtime, she will tell the Starks that their missing girls have found each other, and perhaps more than their fair share of trouble. Until then, she had inventories to conduct, injured soldiers to manage and apprentices to train.

It was a hard life, being Grand Healer to the King in the North.

* * *

There is a caw from above Jon's head, and that raven is back again.

"Sansa?" He asks hopefully.

The bird lands softly in front of him with an affirmative caw, draws an A, S, R and a heart, and taps the image twice.

As before, he feels a quick lance of warmth through his heart. "I love all of you too. Are you with Robb already?"

The bird hisses, and shakes its head twice. Ruffling the bird's feathers, Sansa sketches a Y and looks about expectantly. So, they aren't with Robb yet, but Sansa and their brother are fighting over something. That's unusual, but it's not as though the raven can tell him the details.

"Ygritte is with the hunting party. She should be back soon."

The bird visibly wilts – clearly, Sansa had been looking forward to talking to the Free Woman who seemed to have claimed Jon for herself.

"Did you have a question for her?" A nod. "Can I help?" The head tilts from side to side, considering, before Sansa draws a bow and what could be a dagger, followed by the word _help_.

"You want help with the bow? And… knifework?" Another nod. "I am… not the best with knifework. But I can certainly try to help with the bow, I used to train Bran, do you remember?" The first comment earns a morose croak, but the second gets him a slow nod.

Getting Sansa to hop on his shoulder, Jon wanders through the camp until he finds someone willing to lend him their bow for a moment (explaining that he is trying to teach his little lady sister via a warged raven means that the wildling woman who finally agrees laughs fit to burst, even swollen with child as she is, and then begs that he let her watch).

Jon demonstrates how to draw, aim and fire, giving Sansa the same advice that he had once passed on to Bran and, in secret, Arya. Sansa's bird nods at him, and listens attentively when the wildling Birch adds her own secrets to a faster draw. The raven gives them a graceful avian curtsy, and then hops forward to tap at the bow itself. _How_ , Sansa writes in the snow.

"How … to make a bow?" Jon hazards.

Sansa gives him a quick nod, hopping forward and chirping happily. He turns to Birch to see if she has an answer – he's never had to make a bow before.

If Sansa had asked this question at the start, Jon is sure of what answer they would have received – he knows Birch, if not by name before a half-hour ago, then certainly by face. She doesn't like having a Crow in their midst, hates that this Stark (and no matter how many times he says he's a Snow, _Stark_ is still whispered to his back) is on _their_ side of the Wall, and upon first hearing from Ygritte that one of Jon's sisters had found herself to be a warg, Birch had been amongst the cacklers, dismissing his S _outhron Princesses_ as useless and incapable of such a Northern ability.

To his great shock, Birch offers to teach Sansa rather cheerfully. She makes sure to say that it is not a quick process, to explain that the many stages that lead up to the creation of an excellent bow take time. Sansa nods along to everything that is said, ruffles feathers when she doesn't understand until Jon can get Birch to elaborate on her point, and seems completely enraptured by the whole process.

Ygritte finds them eventually, Sansa's bird on Jon's knee as Birch is discussing the pros and cons of different treatments for bowstring.

"Wha's all this?" Ygritte asks, plonking herself down by Jon and giving Birch a warning look.

The older woman gives the redhead what could generously be called a smile and says, "His sister has teeth, even if she is a Southerner. I'm teaching her how to make them sharper."

Ygritte cocks her head at the bird with a feral grin of her own. "Bows are best," she says agreeably. "When we're south o' the Wall, I'll bring ye a _proper_ one made of weirwood, Sansa Stark."

Jon feels uncomfortable when his little sister _looks_ at him, with those gimlet raven eyes.

Clicking her beak, Sansa ruffles her feathers apologetically at Birch, and drops to the ground.

"You need to go?" Jon asks her. She nods, so he asks again, "Does this bird have a name?"

Sansa cocks her head, then writes in the snow, _||| for a 'Ding_.

"Ding?" A nod. "'Three for a Wedding', huh?"

Sansa gives him a raven laugh, and between one moment and the next, it is just Ding sitting before him. If pressed, Jon wasn't sure he could really explain how he could tell the difference between Sansa being in charge, and Ding being the only mind within the bird – a presence, perhaps, or even the way the body was held.

"The little princess _is_ sharpening her fangs," Ygritte grins at him. "C'mon, Jon Snow, lemme show you somethin' good."

Birch makes vulgar remarks as Ygritte drags him away, and Jon tries hard not to squirm. _Sansa knows_ , he thinks despairingly. Just because she had loved her stories as a child in Winterfell did not make his sister an idiot – indeed, her education had been even greater than his and Robb's, and they were boys. No doubt his sister thought him an oathbreaker, or something similarly awful; she had not drawn a heart before departing this time, had looked at him queerly before she had left, and if she had not hated him before, she certainly hated him _now_.

Miserable, Jon followed Ygritte to the edges of camp.

"Wha's wrong with you?"

"Sansa hates me, I know it." He mumbles.

Ygritte rolls her eyes at him. "How far away is she, this sister of yours?"

"I don't know where she is," He says unhappily. "She was supposed to be in Kings Landing, but I think she's left there and headed north again. So, at least a thousand miles? Maybe two?"

Ygritte stills suddenly. "A thousand? You're sure?"

"Well, give or take a few hundred?"

"A warging of at least a _thousand miles_ to try and find you, and you think she hates you?" He hesitates, before asking if that isn't normal. "No, you idiot. Haven't you noticed that Orrel is always near to his eagle? _That's_ normal for us."

"But she never–!" He begins, stops, and makes a concentrated effort. "What did you want to show me, Ygritte?"

"Nothin', really, just had to tell ya so you don't get uz in trouble. We're going to move out soon, march on the Wall; you better give Mance and them the answers they want, or it's both our arses in the fire ... I want you to show me how that writing works, and I'm going to teach you how to make a bow. I want to help your Sansa Stark too, ok?"

Blinking to keep tears at bay, he can manage only a whisper. "Ok. Thank you, Ygritte. You've got a deal."

* * *

When Sansa opens her eyes, she finds a small flock of ravens waiting for her (Mirth and Sorrow both in their midst), Hot Pie chipperly describing different bread-making processes to Ser Brienne, Gendry sharpening the weapons they took from the Bolton men, Ser Jaime mumbling in his sleep against the bough of a tree, and Arya and Sandor screaming at each other. _Again_.

" – reatest swordsmen who ever lived was killed by Meryn fucking Trant?"

"He was outnumbered –!"

"Any boy whore with a sword could beat three Meryn Trants!"

"Syrio didn't have a sword! Or armour, just a stick!"

"Greatest swordsmen who ever lived didn't have a sword?!" Here he laughed cruelly, and had they been at Winterfell, Sansa is sure that Arya would have sheep shifted Sandor's bed within an inch of its life. "You have a sword, and I've seen what he's taught you. It's a fucking wonder _you're_ not dead."

With an inarticulate scream, Arya launched herself at Sandor with her sword leading; it did not make it past his own armour, though not for lack of force on Arya's part.

" _Arya! Sandor!_ " Sansa's voice cracks across the glade they had shifted to to avoid detection from last night's bonfire. " _What_ in seven _hells_ are you doing?!" She drags herself upright, and then keeps the straightest posture she possibly can. She hopes she is terrifying – her own rage shocks her, and she hopes it shocks the pair before her, too.

Ser Jaime jerks awake, her ravens caw and flock to the horses or the trees, Hot Pie jumps and fumbles the bread he had been using to demonstrate to Brienne, and Gendry's shoulders hunch up about his reddening ears.

Arya and Sandor freeze, Sandor stiff-shouldered and Arya rigid-backed, neither looking at Sansa.

"You aren't _Mother_ ," her sister hisses, voice icy.

"I'm also not a child, like you two seem to be! What has brought this on?!"

Both are too busy glowering at each other to answer, so Sansa swings around to look at their companions. The boys quail before her, and Hot Pie caves first.

"'s about Arry's dancin' Master, Lady Sansa!" He squeaked. "A Braavosi?"

"He wasn't _just_ a Braavosi, he was the former First Swordsman to the Sealord of –!"

"And what does that have to do with screaming at each other like a pair of, of – !"

"Cunts?" Sandor offered drolly, the shoulder closest to her hitched up as though he expected her to hit him.

Sansa made that same boiling-kettle noise she had made during her own argument with Arya the day before, and _feels_ herself flushing in anger. "Sandor, go over there! Arya, over here! And don't either of you talk to each other for the rest of the day!"

Arya growls instead of hissing, gnashing her teeth as she stalks past Sansa to Gendry, throwing herself on the ground beside him. Wordlessly he hands her a dagger and a whetstone, and Arya begins to rasp away at the steel.

Sandor is giving her a funny look again, before growling out, "Walk with me, girl,"

They stalk in to the forest, both of them still in fine tempers.

"You aren't my master, girl." Sandor finally snaps. "I swore you no vows."

"You made me a promise," Sansa agrees, waiting.

"I said I'd never hurt you! But fuck if you don't make it hard some days – I'm not sworn to you, you aren't in charge of me, you can't just _order me around_ like that!"

"Perhaps if you and my sister would stop antagonising each other, we wouldn't be having this conversation!"

"It's training."

"Training!" This time, she is the derisive one. "How is screaming at my twelve-year-old sister _training_?!"

"You're the one who asked her if she can stay impartial with that little kill list of hers! Don't be stupid, Bird, you've heard it, same as me. I'm on her bloody Prayer. If she can't handle me, how can she handle the others? How can she be the North's Master of Laws?"

She is still mad at him, but Sansa feels herself softening at his reasoning, gods damn it all.

"You couldn't have explained that first?" She groans, trying to hold on to her anger.

"That defeats the point," Her shield grumbles back. They are quiet for a moment, before he asks, "Well? Am I forgiven, Little Bird?"

"Aye," She smiles, a soft little thing. "And I'll not tell Arya what you're doing, either. Just, please try and limit it to one fight a day? I don't know that the rest of us can handle it, elsewise."

He smiles back. "Yeah, Bird; I can do that."

They make their way back to their camp, stopping only to pick some wild onions and more healing herbs, and keeping their faces carefully blank so not to give anything away to the others. Sorrow is back with Talisa's reply on how best to treat Ser Jaime's injury, and Sansa sets about trying to follow the careful instructions. It wouldn't do to lose their prisoner before they can _do_ anything with him, after all.

The birds are still waiting for her, Sorrow and Mirth and five other ravens. A crownland bird asking the King's blessing for a betrothal and another from the Westerlands, two replies from noble sons who survived the Blackwater and wished to ally the fears of worried parents, a reply from Aunt Lysa to Petyr Baelish expressing her sincere delight at their impending nuptials, and lastly a _deliciously_ nasty inquiry from Lady Olenna Tyrell to Tywin Lannister about finally saddling his horse and _pulling his finger out_ , which had solicited a shout of laughter from an unprepared Sansa, and various snorts and giggles from around the campsite when she read the letter aloud.

A still-sour Arya spoilt the mood somewhat when she mentioned that the Queen of Thorns had three unmarried grandsons.

After a tense breath, Sansa told her, "Actually, Ser Garlan was married not long before Father became Hand of the King. I can't say that I've heard any whispers of heirs, but whether the lady Leonette is at fault, or whether they simply wait for the Highgarden heir Lord Willas to be married himself, is still up for debate." Carefully she scribed a thank you note for Talisa, adding Jon's love as well and giving the note to Mirth.

"Why don't you marry him, and then Robb can have his armies and you can have –"

"Didn't you listen yesterday?" Sansa snapped back. "Just because you're in a foul mood, doesn't mean you need to be terrible to me! I told you, I don't want to marry anyone; that's why these birds are here, that's what that bow is for, and that is what _he_ – " here she jabbed a finger towards a dosing Ser Jaime "is for! Grow up!"

Each note had been read, transcribed, fixed and reattached as Sansa read it, and each bird had taken off once it had its scroll back again. At her shout, Mirth flew towards Riverrun, and Sorrow alit himself on Sansa's shoulder.

"Gendry! Hot Pie!"

"Y-yes, m'lady!"

"Come with me! I'm going to teach you how to read." Sansa gave an almost-poisonous look to her shield. "Would you please find something for lunch, Sandor? And Lady Brienne, if you would watch my _little sister_ , please, I would appreciate it!" Back straight with temper, Sansa stalked back into the forest with the two boys just behind her.

* * *

Lunchtime at Riverrun is proving to be more… _more_ , than Talisa would like. She keeps trying to take Robb and Catelyn away from the other lords to tell them of this morning's letter, and more and more people just keep coming up and _interrupting_ _them_ , and she's going to hurt someone soon, healers' vows or no.

She has been at this for _two_ _hours_. What the fuck?

"Your Grace, Queen Mother," She finally interrupts some stuffy Riverland lord or another. "Lady and Nymeria sent a letter this morning."

The reaction is instantaneous. The lords are dismissed until it is only the Starks and the Tullys left behind.

"When?" Lady Catelyn begs, desperate.

"The early hours, my lady."

"What did the note say?" Robb demanded. "Why didn't you tell us sooner?"

Here she hesitates, but says quickly enough, "They wrote to me about a medical matter. I don't really know the full details, but I sent them a comprehensive guide on how to treat the injury, and asked that they write back to me with the complete tale. And I've been _trying_ to tell you for a while."

Catelyn releases a relieved sob, but Robb is frowning. "How do they know about you?"

Talisa shrugs. "I don't know; yesterday's bird, mayhaps. The letter was addressed to their goodsister and the bird flew straight to me; however they found out, they know a lot more about me than one would think."

"Can I see the letter?"

"My lady, I don't thi –"

"Talisa, what sort of a medical matter?" Robb worries.

"I don't think it had anything to do with them, your grace. If we just wait for the return letter – "

"What matter, Talisa?"

How does one tell one's husband that his little sisters had been asking about amputation treatments?

Before she can really answer, there is a caw from above. Mirth had taken to following Talisa about to avoid Robb, but the cheeky bird is back again with this morning's Sorrow in the windowsill.

 _ **Goodsister,**_

 _ **Thank you for your help! Does Grey Wind require more cooks or blacksmiths? Let Beta know we love her. We'll see you soon. Ghost says hello!**_

 _ **Lady and Nymeria**_

This answers exactly _nothing_. Talk about an evasion.

"Beta?" Robb askes over her shoulder. "Her?"

"If their code is based around the direwolves," she says softly, "who would be the second-in-command to the pack?"

They both look to Catelyn, who goes through a number of emotions before settling on joy. Her lost daughters wrote of their love for her – what mother wouldn't be happy, in the face of that?

"Who's Ghost?"

"Jon, our half-brother. But he's at the Wall, so I don't know how he can possibly say hello."

Talisa quirks her brow at her husband and points to cheeky Mirth and watchful Sorrow. He gives her an embarrassed smile, and takes the letter from her.

" _Do_ you need any more cooks or smiths?" She asks him cheerfully.

Her husband is busy studying the four lines of text, as though if he stares at it long enough, he will learn all of the girls' secrets. It doesn't appear as though she is going to get any help from Catelyn, either, so she just pens a quick _**looking forward to meeting you too!**_ and _**have heard so much about you!**_ to Sansa and Arya.

She's always wanted a sister, and now she has two.

* * *

Mirth bears the response from Talisa, a positive two-sentence reply, with a query regarding their knowledge of her and a reminder that she is owed an explanation in the Post Script. Sorrow, who had flown off after they had gone in to the forest, bears a message from their mother. Lady Catelyn's words are full of love for her daughters, recalling shared memories fondly and her hopes that they may all be reunited soon.

Sansa throws it at Arya's head when she and the boys return from their impromptu reading lesson on the riverbank, three hours after the initial spat and barely a half-hour before the sun sets. Arya snaps and snarls back, and Sansa wonders if perhaps her sister might not have been telling the Brotherhood a lie, after all.

Then again, she could just be prickly. It had been a very stressing year, and a few days of peace weren't going to changed learned habits.

Sandor is glowering his way through spitting some rabbits, chestnuts roasting in the coals and a pot of tea being tended to by a wary Lady Knight. The Kingslayer is watching everyone as well, even if his eyes are slitted.

"Ser Jaime," Sansa addresses him primly. "If I might see your arm, please?"

He is uncharacteristically quiet when he holds the stump out to her, watching with those sharp green eyes that she so loathes as she follows Talisa' instructions, unwrapping the stump to carefully bath it in a tincture she and the boys had put together, and then bandaging again with linens that they had boiled earlier that day.

"Is there something amiss, ser?"

"You aren't quite how I remember you, Lady Stark," he quips.

"Your son can be thanked for that."

"I don't know what – "

"Please, Ser Jaime," here she tugged on his bandage, causing the knight to hiss and wince. "I spent a lot of time in the presence of both Joffrey and the Queen. He doesn't look anything like Lord Renly or Lord Stannis or King Robert. He looks exactly like his mother – _exactly_ – and not a thing like anybody else. The only other person in all the world who looks that much like Cersei Lannister is her twin brother – _you_."

"And what were you doing, to so frequently be in the presence of the King?" He asks, derisive.

"I was the _reminder,_ my lord. Of how far a noble woman can fall; for every victory of my brother's, I was publicly beaten and humiliated. I was taken up atop the walls every day by Joffrey and his Kingsguard, and I had to look at my father's head, and the heads of our household, until the King told me I could look away. I was without a maid for a long time. That might not sound like too terrible a thing, but there was no one to help me do my hair or my clothes, when a woman's status at court is held by her appearance, her family name and the rumours that surround her. There was no one to empty my pot, and I was mocked and beaten when I did it for myself, so I had to learn where all of the public drops were on my own, go only in the early hours or not at all, to salvage what remained of my reputation. No one wished to curry the King's displeasure, so they all stayed away from me – Sandor and your brother's mistress were the closest to friends I had in that whole festering city."

Shae had never told her how she had come to Kings Landing, and had stated rather simply that it was Lord Tyrion who had placed her in Sansa's service as a kindness. In hindsight it's a wonder she didn't figure it out sooner.

 _Porcelain, Ivory, Steel._

"It's a wonder you don't hate him, then," the fallen knight quipped lightly.

Sansa blinks at him. "What makes you think I don't? Because I'm _good_? Because I'm Ned Stark's daughter? Because I always tried to be the most perfect lady that I possibly could? I assure you, Ser Jaime, if the opportunity to put one of my arrows in Joffrey's heart arises, _I will take it_."

She tied the last knot in the bandages, rose and glided back to the main camp. "Sandor, Hot Pie – how fares dinner?"

The little cook is watching her fearfully again. "Lady Sansa, it's only just gone on."

"Lady Sansa, perhaps you could practice your shots again?" Gendry offers. "You missed some, yesterday. Hot Pie, Arry, will you call when dinner's ready?

Sansa raises her brows as the others voice their agreement, and allows Gendry to walk with her. She takes them further in to the forest than perhaps she would have gone on her own, far enough in that they can hear a shout, but not so close that any conversation of theirs could be accidentally overheard.

"What did you want to talk about?" Sansa askes gently.

" … When we find your brother and mother, what will happen to everyone?"

Sansa hummed, restrung her bow and started to pace and shoot, practicing this as a just-in-case for future skirmishes. "Brienne will go back to protecting Mother. Ser Jaime will return to the dungeons. Sandor will either be imprisoned, scripted into training soldiers, or perhaps even continuing on as my guard. Yourself and Hot Pie may be offered positions within the smithy and kitchens. Depending on our gamble, Arya and I are either going to be granted the immunity of the Council positions, or will be married off to raise troop numbers." She watches him out of the corner of her eye, crow-like, and observes the stiffening of his shoulders, the forced casualness of his slump against a nearby tree. "Nymeria and the wolves will take their time to get here, and time again to organise logistics. If one were to train every day with master knights, one could perhaps become a sworn shield of a princess, too."

He looks up in shock, blue eyes blown wide. Sansa takes a tricky shot, aiming for a knot on one of the highest branches of the tree he leant against. "If a sheltered noble girl can learn the bow in a week, I don't see why a strong young smith cannot come to learn and master the sword. We can speak with Brienne and Sandor after dinner – train with them in the mornings, and learn your letters with me or Arya in the afternoons, and we'll see how you fare by the time the wolves have joined us. How does that sound?"

Joy replaces shock, and is replaced in turn by a wicked smirk that Sansa _knows_ she has seen before. On another face, black haired and blue eyed, in Kings Landing.

"Thank you, Lady Sansa! Thank you!"

She smiles back at him softly, squishing her sudden understanding down as surely as she had forced away pain and all other emotions when in the presence of the Queen or her monstrous son.

"It's not a bother," She says prettily, taking three more shots in a rapid volley. It isn't as accurate as she would like; _one problem at a time, Sansa_ , she tells herself. _We can do this._

 _Winter is coming._

* * *

Dinner was uncomfortable and quiet. Everyone retired as soon as they possibly could; Lady Knight and Kingslayer bedded down by the horses, Gendry and Hot Pie under a tree, the Hound by his horse and wrapped in his cloak, Sansa in her bedroll with Mercy, Sorrow and Mirth, and Arya by the fire with Needle and her thoughts.

Before their father had died, Sansa had been predictable. Near all of Arya's life, she had known exactly how Sansa would react, close as she followed the rules as their world knew them.

She wasn't predictable anymore, and Arya didn't like it.

Rickon was dead. Bran was dead. Sansa was _weird_. Jon was north, and Sansa was refusing to talk about him. Robb was at Riverrun with birdshit all over his face or something, and a _wife_. Mother was with Robb. Father was dead. Their family was small, and if they weren't careful, it would keep getting smaller. She hadn't lied, when she told Tywin that anyone can be killed, even if she'd meant it as a threat.

Her world was getting smaller and smaller even as the world in general became larger and larger, and all she could do was think about Sansa's comments yesterday, about being Robb's Master of Laws. Could she do that? Once, yes. The daughter of Winterfell she had been only two years ago would have been more than capable of growing into such a role, and would have been _good_ at it. But this nothing creature (Arry, Lana, Weasel, No One) and her list of dead men? Sansa had been right. If she came face-to-face with the Tickler, what would she do? If she found the Mountain, or Joffrey, or Cersei? She was handling the Hound well enough, but that was only because of what he had done for her sister. She wasn't going to _forgive_ him any time soon – but she could let go of her need for vengeance. And, when she thought about it, that might explain why the Hound had been such a, a cunt to her the last two days, and why Sansa hadn't said anything much about this morning's argument. He was _training_ her, and it was galling.

She missed the world making _sense_ , she missed _Winterfell_ , she missed her family and her countrymen and her direwolf, and she wished desperately that Nymeria and her pack would hurry up! There wasn't much of anything she could do about that, though – but she _could_ see what was taking so long!

She reached for Nymeria again, calling to her wolf and hoping for good news. The slip from two legs to four was easy, the adjustment to the increased scents and sounds a little harder, and the presence of her wolf circling her mind and soul was comforting.

 _My girl!_ Nymeria was glad to have her, at least. _What is wrong?_

Arya told her everything, how strange this new Sansa was, her list, how she would have to adjust her ideas of justice, the Hound, the fight, how much she _missed_ the rest of their pack and the days of old. Nymeria ran the whole time, her pack of hundreds matching her and an awareness at the edges of both female's mind.

 _Pack_ , Nymeria thinks sadly, _can change. Birth-pack are always inside, always close._ There is a fluttering, as Nymeria sent her thoughts out to their brothers – Grey Wind close and growing closer, Ghost over the Wall and past their reach, Summer and Shaggydog far North but still on _this_ side of the Wall –

Arya felt her heart stop. _THEY LIVE?!_

 _Yes? You … humans cannot tell. Oh, my girl_.

Nymeria called for a slowing of the pace, the pack now a steady lope as she sent her/their thoughts out towards Summer and Shaggy.

 _Brothers! Brothers, join the Pack once again!_

Four direwolves raised their heads and howled for their missing pack. Four Starks startled, and three were dragged in to the mind joining.

 _Alive alive alive alive!_ Arya crowed it across the link, touching the edges of her baby brothers' minds. _Are you ok, where are you, how are you_ alive _, they all say you're dead!_

 _Bran? Rickon?_ Robb's voice came across choked, his emotions fairly singing, a mirror to Arya's own joy, grief still thick on its tails.

Bran sends across the impression of wide eyes, _shock-and-hope-and-love_ all mixed together. Rickon is just … shocked. He barely recognises them, not Robb's beard or Arya haircut and the muck and mire of war, though he can understand who they must be because of the wolves.

 _Where?_ Both little brothers send back.

Robb gives them the images of Riverrun's great castle, of _Beta_ -Mother and _Mate_ -Talisa and the greatwar-northmen-pack.

Arya adds her sensation of the forest, the smells and presence and _pack_ (Sansa-Gendry-HotPie) and _tagalongs_ (Hound, Lady Knight, Kingslayer).

The boys are a jumble of memories full of emotions and scents and impressions: Osha and Hodor, their _home_ burning, and hiding, and escaping, and the track North North North to Jon, the Reeds.

 _No use_ , Arya sends. _Sansa says Jon's beyond the Wall_.

 _How does she know?_ Bran demands, shocked.

 _Warg. All of us, we're wargs. Sansa just figured it out first._

 _Why isn't she here too?_ Rickon demands, young and piping.

Arya sends back the memory of Nymeria attacking Joffrey, of the time spent hiding in the forest and trying to chase Nymeria away, the Queen's call for blood and Lady's price. Grief bounced across the bonds, with rage hot on its tail. _Vengeance,_ wild Shaggy and Rickon demanded.

 _Wait,_ Bran cautioned. _Let Sansa say what she wants._

 _I'm going to kill the Queen,_ Arya snaps at him. _Get in line!_

 _How?_ Three minds asked, all accompanied by the image of coltish, stick-thin Arya of Winterfell in a towering temper and little fists stuffed full of sheep shit her only weapons.

Arya gives them her memories of Syrio, every hurt and every lesson, every cat and cut and parry, twirls and twists and the sword that Gendry had taught her how to maintain, the sharped dagger in each boot. Gives them the image of Sansa, stringing and drawing and unstringing her bow again and again and again, regardless of how bored or pained she must have been. Gives them the carved targets that, more often than not, are struck; faceless bodies collapsing with Sansa's arrows heavy in hearts or throats.

 _All wolves have teeth_ , she sneers at them. _Even the ones that look like gilded dogs._

 _How far are you from me?_ Robb demanded. _I'll come get you_.

 _You will not! Once the pack gets here, we'll do what_ we _want, and then we'll take the North back and rescue the babies!_

 _I am_ oneyear younger _than you!_

 _But_ I _don't need a rescue. Nymeria?_

The count was less than she had expected – the pack moved quicker than Nymeria had originally thought. Another four nights, and she would have her wolf back, and an army of her _own_.

 _I can be there before Nymeria. I can bring you girls both back to Mother; she misses all of you!_

Arya sends the image of the letter that Mother had written, that Sansa had chucked at her head, and growled at her big brother. _Just because you're the King, doesn't mean you should_ always _get your way!_ She gives him Sansa's impassioned speech from the day before, of expected desires and actual wants, sends the image of Mirth and Anguy, of Sorrow and herself, thinks _how close will Grey Wind let another wolf get to you?_ and sends them all the image of cocked legs and the hot scent of dog piss. Robb gives back anger, a tinge of panic, and a great collision of older-brother-protectiveness that put Arya's and Nymeria's hackles both up.

With a growl and the impression of snapping jaws, Nymeria and her girl sever themselves from the bond. Arya stayed with the wolves until her rage quieted, watched the countryside role away beneath padded feet, and planned.

* * *

 _Little sisters are the worst!_

Arya had awoken Sansa before even dawn's pale fingers were touching the horizon. She had done so by _spitting on Sansa's face_.

" _What the fuck was that for?!_ " Sansa whisper-shrieked, trying not to wake any of the others and scrubbing desperately at her cheeks and mouth. Sandor jerked upright and Brienne snorted awake, regardless.

"Did you just swear, Bird?"

" _Don't laugh!_ Arya, did you just _spit_ on me?!"

"Robb's a warg too." The smaller girl said, stony and unrepentant. "The direwolves can find each other, and share an awareness of each other. I dreamt Nymeria last night, and she called her brothers for me. Robb _might_ be coming to find us, so send Talisa a letter to head him off. Bran and Rickon are alive, and North. I'm going to Stone Hedge with Gendry to sell some horses. Don't kill Hot Pie. Don't follow me; stop squawking."

Before Sansa could do any more than gape – _their little brothers_ lived?! – the two youths had grabbed the leads of two of the poorer horses, and were gone.

"Little Bird?" Sandor asked, worried.

"I – I'll be fine." She breathed back, giving her face a final, absent-minded swipe. "I, um – go back to sleep. I'm going to try something. Sorrow, Mirth?"

The two birds squawked back at her, shuffling down Mercy's back and then hopping down by her bedroll. Grabbing for her writing kit and stoking the fire, Sansa penned a quick message for Robb, tied it to Mirth and instructed her to take it to Talisa as soon as it was light enough.

 _ **Goodsister,**_

 _ **DO NOT let Grey Wind come for us – we'll come to you when we're ready. Tell him I'll find Summer and Shaggy. Thank you for the medical help. Lady and Nymeria.**_

Sansa laid back down, and thought as hard as she could on her little brothers, drawing on countless memories and crafting within her mind Bran and Rickon as she had best known them. Her breath slowed, each heartbeat she felt from her head to her toes, and when she opened her eyes again she was in a crow unknown to her.

 _Four for a birth_. Bir.

Beneath the resting bird (flighty, this one, young, and almost as uninterested in being warged as Ding) were two beloved redheads, two direwolves, and their companions.

Bir wasn't going to speak for her, she could tell already. Bir didn't want to flit down to join humans and wolves, either, but on this point Sansa would not bend. She dropped them both straight on to Summer's head, and croaked.

Bran sat up like he'd been struck, eyes drawn immediately to the raven atop his Direwolf.

"Arya?!"

Sansa hissed at him, puffing Bir up and wishing the contrary bird would let her give him her name.

" _Sansa?!_ Arya was telling the truth, you're a warg too?!"

She hissed again, wishing that she had someone that she could talk to her brothers and give them all a good scolding for such a lack of faith.

Bran's blue eyes grew, impossibly, even wider.

"Sansa?"

She cocked her head back at him, ruffling her feathers. She wonders what it is that has taken his fancy, to shock him so.

"I'm not _fanciful!_ "

Sansa's breath catches. _Bran? You hear this?_

"Yes, I – I don't know why, but I _can_. Sansa, what has happened since you left? Are you alright? Arya didn't say anything, but she showed us memories, and – _can you really shoot like that?_ "

Sansa thinks of her practicing, her fat rabbits, the night they rescued Ser Jaime and Lady Brienne and the lives she had snuffed out, and watches the awe grow in her younger brother's eyes.

"That's _amazing_! When did you take up the bow?"

 _After Sandor and I escaped. A little over a week ago._

"No way. Sansa, you can't be that good after a _week_ , nobody is!"

 _I practiced._ She thinks of the wry smirk she would give her brother if she could, and then gives a raven's laugh when he blushes bright as their hair.

"I practiced," he says petulantly. Sansa gives him her memories, hours spent stringing-drawing-unstringing and hours more aiming-firing-collecting-assessing. "Well, of course I didn't practice _that_ much! I had _other_ things to do!" She thinks of the spots that Bran had been found in, and laughs again at his awkward shuffling.

"Bran?" Rickon calls sleepily. "Wha' ya doin'?"

"Rickon, it's Sansa! It's as Arya said, she's in this raven!"

 _Bir_ , Sansa thinks. _Four for a Birth_.

"It's nice to meet you, Bir," Bran says courteously. There is a spark of amusement in the back of Sansa's head where Bir is watching.

Rickon crawls over Shaggy to collapse on Bran's legs. "'s it Sansa or Bir?"

"Bir is the bird's name, but Sansa is inside – like when we dream we're Shaggy or Summer."

Rickon blinks at her through his tumbled curls. "I'm glad you're safe, and that you learnt to fight. Will you teach me how to shoot like that when you come back?"

Sansa nods eagerly, but adds, _You will need to practice hard, baby brother_.

"Are you going to kill the Queen for what she did to Lady?" Rickon doesn't seem to hear her, as Bran does, and Sansa squashes panic down so as not to alert him. Is this something only Bran can do? How lonely. But, at least there is one of her scattered brothers that can understand her when she wargs, she supposes.

She has Bir give a raven-shrug, and says for Bran, _I don't know yet. It is easy to kill a stranger, in the heat of the moment. I hate her and her son so much that I could do it – but should I? Would that be just?_

"It would be your right, Sansa." Bran says firmly. "Not just for Lady, but for Father and our household, too."

Their faces flash through her minds' eye, Father and Jory and Vayon and Septa and _everyone_ , and it is all she can do to not think on their faces on the battlements; she will spare Bran _that_ , if nothing else.

"Where are you and Arya? The Riverlands somewhere?"

Bir nods, and Sansa adds, _Don't tell Robb. I'm still mad at him, and he's not listening to us._

"That's what Arya said. Unless the wolves let us share a mindspace again, I don't think I can pass anything to him, anyway. How did Bir find us so quickly? Is it ok to be without your warg?"

 _Bir is my fourth Raven. Sorrow was first, and he's still with me. Mirth is flying to Robb. Ding is Beyond the Wall with Jon. All the ravens around me come to me, I called them. I read all of the scrolls before anybody else, and I take down what I need to pass on to Robb so he'll believe me. I'm going to be Robb's Master of Whispers._

A smile grows across Bran's face. "And Arya?"

 _Master of Laws. Maybe._

"Sansa as the Master of Whispers and Arya as the Master of Laws," Bran tells Rickon, grin growing sharp. "You're going to change the _world_!"

* * *

 **Yes, my sister has spat on my face to wake me up. So have two of my four brothers, and at least one cousin. Family is gross like that.**


	4. Chapter 4 Stamp on the Ground (Jump)

**Chapter Four. Stamp on the Ground (Jump, jump, jump, jump)**

 **Thank you once again for all of the beautiful reviews! Loving all the sibling tales that came out**

 **ALSO! Australia has a new pterosaur! Butch was released on October fourth, and his scientific name is _Ferrodraco lentoni_ \- if anyone is interested, google the scientific name and **nature **dot** com **, it should be the first thing that comes up.**

 **Chapter warning for canon-typical violence and sexism.**

* * *

"Wake up!"

With a growl, the King of Winter and the Trident jerked up and away from his wife, right off the bed and onto the floor. "Oof!"

"What on earth has you making such a fuss in your sleep, Robb?"

Rubbing at his rear and squinting back up at her, he said, "What? I was not."

"You were howling, dear. It woke me up. What were you dreaming of?"

"The boys, and Arya. They're all alive! The direwolves are connected, Grey Wind was able to show me Summer and Shaggy and Nymeria. Arya and Sansa aren't that far away at all, I can ride out with Grey Wind and collect them, and we'll be back in a few days!"

"And if you ride off into the sunrise to chase down your sisters based on a dream, you will have no army left when you return." Talisa snapped. "The girls have sent so many letters saying that they are traveling here – let them come to you, my love. You are their King."

"… Just because I'm the King, doesn't always mean I should get my way," Robb says ruefully. "Arya gave me quite the tongue-lashing last night!"

"Well, she sounds very sensible to me," Talisa says primly, a smirk tucked away in the corner of her mouth.

Robb gives her a big, silly dog grin for that. "After you have met her, I challenge you to say that again, my love. Be that as it may, though, I'd like to at least send someone out to help escort them back. They are still only girls."

" _Only?_ "

"Sansa is not yet five-and-ten. Arya is only just turned three-and-ten."

"And yet the letters we have received tell us that they have both escaped, mostly unscathed and with very little help. They are making their way to you, and have avoided capture so far. They will be fine – stop worrying."

With his head cocked to one side, unerringly like Grey Wind, Robb asked, "And do you not worry for your own little brother?"

He can't read the look his wife gives him for that. Finally, she huffs and says, "A few days, you say? Where are they?"

"Off the River Road, between Stone Hedge and Raventree Hall. Two days from here one-way."

"Can you be without Grey Wind for half a week?"

"Wh – yes?"

"I have a plan."

* * *

The half-day trip to Stone Hedge had been thankfully uneventful. Arya and Gendry hadn't gotten quite as much for the two nags and the tack as they would have liked, but they made up for it in smithing. Their breaks for food were also used for extra sword practice, with Gendry going through the drills that Ser Brienne had been teaching him, and then going through Syrio's lessons with Arya. They had spent the night in an inn, paying with their coin from the smithing so that Sansa and the others couldn't complain. They had awoken early the next morning to get in more practice and to do another half-day of smithing, bought some bread and cheese from the market, and rode back to the group on Wolverine, who they supposed Sansa must have sent after them – the note asking that they try and purchase salt was in her pretty hand. They'd used the note to help Gendry practice his letters, too, so all in all they felt like they had had a very productive two days.

They arrived at their little clearing to Hot Pie stirring a stew, Brienne and the Hound practicing together, and Sansa tending to the Kingslayer's hand once more.

"Thank you for Wolverine, Lady Sansa," Gendry called, hopping down from the mount. Sansa gave him an absent-minded smile over her shoulder, tying off the bandage and then swooping down on Arya.

The hug her sister gave her was tight and warm, and the look Arya received when Sansa held her out at armslength was fierce.

"We are a pack, and we need to start acting like it. I've been talking to Bran, trying to figure out what our next move ought to be, but I want to hear your thoughts, too." An arm shot up and grabbed Arya's ear in a vice-like grip, twisting when she struggles. "Stop running off, and stop being a brat. I want you and Gendry to go practice with Sandor and Lady Brienne for another hour before dinner. I'll tend to Wolverine, thank you."

Spinning Arya around by her ear, Sansa pushed her towards the Hound, and gave Gendry an expectant look. The Hound was upon Arya before she had much of any chance to complain past cursing and drawing her stolen blade, and Gendry resignedly went to the Lady Knight, drawing his sword too and taking a stance opposite the hulking woman.

The hour passed in what felt like both a blur and an eternity to Arya, as she spun and danced around his tall frame, knocking aside his blade when she could, and tumbling whenever she couldn't. Precious Sansa spent the hour sewing, from what Arya could see.

"Ser Hound! Lady Knight! Dinner is ready!" Arya could have kissed Hot Pie when he finally put an end to their "training session". Like anything Hot Pie made, the stew was delicious, and doubly so for the hunger their training had brought on. The bread and cheese that they had bought at Stone Hedge went well with the meal too, and Arya felt almost like a King, for the feast.

She sobered quickly when she realised that _her brother_ was King, now.

"How long until Nymeria arrives?" Sansa asked her.

"Three nights."

"Could you get to Raventree Hall and back in that time? Sell some of the other horses?"

"We have nine left to get rid of before we reach Robb – I can't sell too many at a time, it'd be suspicious."

"Two at Raventree Hall, and then one each at the inns and smaller holdfasts along the way to Riverrun, and we should be fine. When you come back from the Hall we should have the pack, and we can spend the travel to each of those locations planning so that we're ready to join up with Robb and make our moves." Sansa hesitated, before whispering, "We will need to split up, at Riverrun."

"What? No! We just found each other!"

"Robb needs more forces, and Jon needs help too." Sansa snapped. "I'm going to go to the Vale to ask Aunt Lysa and cousin Robert to back the King of Winter, and I'm going to exact justice on Petyr Baelish."

"Littlefinger? What did _he_ do?" Arya demanded.

"He is the reason that Father is _dead_ rather than at the Wall, or home, and he told terrible lies about Mother." Sansa snarled.

"Let me come with you, then, I can help –!"

"No, Arya. I need you and Nymeria's pack to take back Winterfell and the North, and to rescue Bran and Rickon."

"So you're just going to go off to the Vale with _him_?!" She pointed violently at the Hound.

"If he would come with me, I would value Sandor's company." Sansa answered coldly. "Hot Pie and I have spoken, and he will look after Robb for us, and intercept my ravens for him too. I would have you and Gendry go with the wolves. If we can convince Robb, I would send Lady Brienne and Ser Jaime with you too, on their way to the Wall."

Arya gaped. "You want to send _him_ to the Nights Watch?"

"They need trainers, and Ser Jaime has been called one of the greatest swordsmen in the Seven Kingdoms. Sandor already said that none of the Lannisters would end the war for his freedom, so we may as well send him somewhere useful. If Mother would allow it, I have asked Lady Brienne to act as a guard for you on the trip up and back."

"So, what, once we take Winterfell back, what would you have me do, Sansa?"

"Rule on Robb's behalf. There must always be a Stark in Winterfell, and the boys need you. You are the fiercest of all of us, little sister, and the next eldest after Robb and I."

"I want to be able to fight in this war too," Arya growled. "I am a Direwolf, and done with wooden teeth."

"Then we shall see if we can't find some way for the boys to be surrounded by loyalists, and then you and Gendry can head back south again, if you really want to."

"We'll need more than wolves to retake our home," Arya sighed finally, after a lengthy pause. "They can't scale walls."

Sansa is silent for a time, thinking hard. "Not all of the Northern host went to war with Robb, did they? Why not ask the Mountain Clans – Father's grandmother was a Flint, and you were named for her, and have the Stark look besides. Speak with them."

"If they wanted to fight, wouldn't they be trying to rout out the Ironborn, already?" Arya demands. "If they won't fight on their own, why would they fight for me?"

"S'not as if we would have fought, before," said Hot Pie. "if you hadn't fired us up, Arry."

"He's right," said Gendry. "We'd've just stayed at Harrenhal, but you convinced us to go and fight back. If anyone can do it, you can."

"They're still not enough, though, are they? We'll need more men than even the Mountains can give us." Arya grumbled, trying to hide her blush.

Hesitatingly, Sansa said, "Do you remember… When they found the direwolves, it was the first time in two hundred years that any had been seen south of the Wall? And they – Father and the boys – had gone to execute the third Nights Watch deserter that year. What made that year different? Why so many deserters, what reason would a pregnant Direwolf have to leave her home? Why so many Wildling raids, and why is Jon with them? I need more information."

"You spend more time in your birds than out of them, these days," the Hound growled at Sansa.

"It cannot be helped. I'll be fine, Sandor, don't worry."

"Wildlings, then?" her little sister presses. "D'you want me to treat with their King for Robb too, and bring them all across for Winter?"

Sansa frowns back at her. "I didn't say that, I said I need to know more!"

Arya licks her lips, says, "Tonight, ask Jon why he is with the Wildlings. I'll put this plan of yours to Robb, and see if he will back us."

"It's not even a plan! Arya, listen, we cannot put anything before the King until we are sure of our course and our actions!"

"But he's not just a King, he's _Robb_!"

"Do you think I have lived so long by acting familiar with royalty?" Sansa spat, launching to her feet. "Do you have any idea what I have been _doing_ , since they took Father's head?"

"I was _there_ , I saw you and your pretty dress and your pretty hair!"

"And did you see them take Father's head? Did you have to watch it _rot_ , day after day after day, for as long as it pleased the King for you to look? Did you get beaten for every single success of the Northern campaign?"

"What?" Jaime croaked from the side. "You were a political prisoner – you shouldn't have been harmed!"

Sansa has their mother's blue eyes, but in that moment it looks as though they are filled with such a raging fire that Arya is worried someone or something will catch alight. "I should not have been touched, Ser Jaime. And my father should still have his head. But here we are. Perhaps you would like to see my back? There are still bruises healing from the mailed fists of the Kingsguard. Or perhaps the backs of my thighs – there are yet cuts that still weep from Meryn Trant's blade."

She turns that furious look back onto Arya, but even as they're watching the fury is drained and replaced by a look of calm diplomacy. "I'll ask Bran and Jon what they know about the Wildlings, and the Mountain Clans. Is there anything else?"

Arya draws in a deep breath, steadies herself, and then finally says, "Tell them I love them and miss them. I'll tell Robb the same. Gendry and I will leave before the predawn – is there anything else you would like us to get at the Hall?"

"I would like more thread – black, grey or white if they have them – and whatever dark cloth is easiest to barter for. Hot Pie, you said something about wanting flour?"

"I mean, if you can, Arry, I'd love some!" The little cook piped, trying to make his cheer seem less forced. "And some potatoes or a pumpkin or two, if you can."

"I'll do my best. Anything else?"

At the negative response from the circle, they broke to sleep and everyone headed for their bedrolls.

The night before them was long and dark, and no one was sure of what terrors awaited them.

* * *

Sandor was, perhaps, right to worry for Sansa. The more she warged her ravens, the harder it was becoming to go back to being just Sansa Stark. She hadn't noticed immediately, with everything else happening, with her own desire to gather what information she could and then race back to her own body, but since they had settled in the little clearing to await the pack it had started to become more obvious.

Ding did not welcome her any more than he had previously, but it was perhaps a little easier to convince him to go to Jon. Her half-brother was in a bedroll of his own, with Ygritte camped very close to him indeed.

 _hiissssssAAAARRRKK_ , she croaked. _Jon_ was too difficult for Ding to say as of yet, and whilst _Snow_ was possible, Sansa needed to get her brother's attention. She needed to let him know how she saw him.

Jon shot up as though she'd slapped him, startling Ding and making Sansa work to keep the bird at the end of the bedroll.

"Sansa?" He demanded, hope bright in sleep-dull eyes.

 _aaaaaayyee_

"Are you well? Are you with Robb yet?"

A nod to the first, a headshake to the second.

"Is something wrong?"

With a croak, Sansa hopped forward to tug at Jon's wildling furs, cocking her head to one side.

 _hhhoooooooowwwww?_

Her brother's face did something complicated, and his eyes shifted about the camp. So she gave him a nod, and croaked, _whhhhyyyyyyyyuh?_

"… You'll think me mad, but I swear it's the truth. On Father's soul, I swear it."

Sansa jerks them back, and stares at her brother with the widest eyes a raven can make. She is not going to like this.

Jon swallowed, licked his lips, and whispered, "The Dead are coming. Just like in Old Nan's stories. I've seen them myself, fought them myself. They do not feel pain, nor exhaustion. Fire is the only thing that seems to work on them. That's why the Free Folk are trying to scale the Wall."

… She _does not like this_.

She taps the ground and sketches a question mark, hoping that Jon understands.

"How many? I don't know. An army, if I had to wager, of man and beast alike. I've heard… stories, of clans wiped out and bands going missing overnight. When I was at Craster's Keep, I saw him take his newborn son, his _ninety-ninth_ son, into the woods and give him to a White Walker. Mance says that the babes are turned into new Walkers."

Ding – Sansa – their body shakes all over, and it takes every hard-won court-learnt nerve to still their shared body, and try to get Ding's beak around _Ghost_. She has an answer for Arya and Robb, and now she needs to change the subject for her own strength of mind.

"Ghost? I'm not sure where he is."

 _wAAAArg_. Warg does not come to them easily either, it seems.

"Warg?" Ygritte's voice is cheerful and right in Sansa's ear, startling Ding so badly he almost throws Sansa out of his head. Sansa hisses and scolds Ygritte accordingly. "Sorry, Sansa Stark!" The ginger says unrepentantly, grin bright. "Didya mean that your brother is a warg too?"

Still fluffed up, Sansa nods.

"Sansa, I'm not," Jon grumbled. "Is that what you woke me for?"

She stares at him, hopping forward to his chest and croaking, _wAAAAAARRRRRRggg, hssOOOHssssstuh._

"Sansa, I'm not a warg. Ow!"

Sansa pecks at him, then tries to wrap Ding's beak around what she wants to say.

 _rOOOOOOOb. hisssssssAAANhnnsaaaaa. AAAARRRRyaaa. bahrAAAAAAAANNNNN. wAAAAARRRRRgg._

"Just because everyone else is a warg doesn't mean that I am, Sansa. You didn't say Rickon's name, either."

She hisses at him, and Ygritte pipes, "Is that because your Ding can't say it, Sansa Stark?"

She nods, and looks to her brother expectantly.

"No, Sansa, I'm sorry, but – "

She caws, cutting him off. Bran had told her of their shared mindspace; Lady is dead, so Sansa can never join her siblings in this way. But Ghost still lives, and there is a chance yet for Jon. If Jon can join with their siblings, can join with Arya at the least, or even Bran, then Sansa can gain the information she needs and try and plan from there.

"Do you dream, Jon Snow?" Ygritte asks, voice barely more than a breath. "Do you dream yourself a beast?"

"They're only dreams –!"

"Dreams ring _true_ , Stark, don't you listen?" Ygritte snaps. "Sansa, is there a reason you want him to warg?" At Sansa's nod, understanding blooms in Jon's eyes.

"That's why you want me to call Ghost?"

"Ghosts can't help us, Jon Snow."

"No, my Direwolf. We all had one – Ghost, Grey Wind, Lady, Nymeria, Bran's wolf and Shaggydog."

 _sssssssUUmmmmmerrrrrrr_

"He named his wolf _Summer_?"

 _AAAAAyyyyeeee_

"Well, at least he came to a name."

"Is there anything else, Sansa?" Ygritte asks cheerfully.

There are a lot of things Sansa would like to ask, but Jon can't hear her as Bran can, and she has no wolf to join him with. So she shakes her head, and goes to drop the warg.

"Sansa, wait!" Jon begs suddenly. "Before, did you call me Stark?"

She hops closer to him, so that she might comb through his hair with Ding's beak as she had done once before for Arya with Sorrow.

 _hiissssssAAAARRRKK_

She drops the warging.

* * *

"Go on then, Jon Snow," Ygritte says as Ding flies away, simply a bird once again. "Call your Direwolf. Call to Ghost, and run with your brothers and sisters."

"I don't know how!"

"Well don't look a' me, I'm not a warg! Think on your Ghost, and call to him. That's all I've got for you."

He thinks on the wolf as hard as he can – the tiny runt that he had first found, separated from his siblings, the gangly creature that Ghost had been when the King arrived, the leggy animal he had been when first they joined the Watch, the wolf-sized pup he had been when first they went ranging. So wrapped up in his memories of Ghost is he that Jon almost misses their joining, the slip from two legs to four instinctive and easy. It is then that Jon realises that he has done this before, in his sleep – Ghost has always been there with him.

His wolf is happy to feel him aware of their connection, and even happier to see that it was Sansa who had shown him the way.

 _Little Sister's girl grew teeth. As well she should, with the death of the Little Sister._

 _Lady is dead?_ Jon demands, shocked. _Is that why Sansa is using ravens?_

Ghost gives the impression of a shrug, before hunkering down and inching forward on his belly. He is trying to catch a hare, and whilst he misses Jon and loves him terribly, he is also hungry, and will not pass up this opportunity for a meal.

 _Little Sister died many moons ago. Her girl has been broken since. Her girl might have felt the need to use birds without access to a real companion._

Jon hadn't thought his wolf could be so dismissive or scathing, but then again, Ghost had often been denied attention from Jon in favour of Maester Aemon's ravens. Perhaps it made sense that he would be bitter still.

 _Where are you, boy? Will you come back to me?_

 _Not yet. Things to do first. Have to look after your new pack. We will join again soon, though._ He gives the memory of rescuing Sam from a wight, and springs on his prey. Jon tries to distance himself from the sheer rush of blood, but isn't quite quick enough. Wolf _pride-pleasure-victory_ and human disgust war, but _Jon_ is in _Ghost,_ to whom this is survival.

 _Have you mated your woman yet?_ Ghost askes, almost as an afterthought.

Jon splutters. _I swore oaths!_

 _You are a wolf_ , Ghost scoffs. _She is beautiful, and wild and fierce. She will give you strong pups, and watch your back when you or I cannot. I approve. Move quick, though, for she is desired by others. You might not see it, but I can see through you._

Jon feels himself blushing fiercely.

 _Call to me when you go past the massive-magic-manrock, and I will come._

When he sends the image of the Wall, Jon sends back the impression of a nod. _Be safe_ , he bids his wolf, before drawing back to his own body. Ygritte is watching him, expression proud and hungry.

"You did it?"

"I found him. He's with my friend Sam, trying to keep him safe from the White Walkers."

"Is he big, your Direwolf?"

"Ghost? Not yet, he's only half-grown."

"Is he old, this Sam?"

"No, he's of an age with myself."

"But your friend needs a pup to protect him?" Ygritte asks, confused.

"He's not the best at arms," Jon admits, scratching his neck. "He was the heir to Horn Hill, and his father made him take the Black because of it. Sam is a reader, though, he's really clever."

"How can anyone be that bad at arms?" Ygritte demanded.

"It's different, in the South. Sam's from the Reach, and they don't have to worry about training as much as a Northern heir does. I heard that lots of Southerners are like that. But I suppose when you have crops all season, every season bar the winter, and never see snow _until_ the winter, that'd make sense."

Ygritte looks intrigued by the idea, but seems to decide to follow another course of action instead. "So. Wha's it like to be a warg, now?"

Jon tries to find the words, and comes up short. "It's… it's different, other. Ghost thinks and feels and sees differently to me. I heard what he thought in words, only because that's how I could best understand it. He heard me in … impressions? In sounds and scents and memories. Words don't mean as much to him, but he knows that I need them, so he used them where he could. He is just as much in my head as I am in his."

She cocked her head at him, raven-like – with that hair, fox-like. "I've never heard it described that way before. You Starks… you're something else." That hungry look is back in her eyes. "Come with me, Jon Snow. Lemme show you something."

She had wrapped up her roll whilst he warged, and so brings it with her when she takes him out into the forest, deeper and deeper until he really truly starts to worry.

"Ygritte?"

"I wanted to wait. There's a cave another few days march from here, and we were gonna camp near it, but this will have to do." She turns to him, face alight. "You made some vows. I want you to break 'em."

"Which ones?" Jon hedges, trying not to show any fear.

"That you'll take _no women for your own_. I want you, Jon Snow, and I know you want me. I want you to see me, all o' me, and if that has to wait until the cave then it'll wait. But I _want_ you, and I would like to have you."

Ghost's voice echoes in his head, _beautiful, and wild and fierce; give you strong pups, and watch your back_ , and Jon tries to think instead of his vows, _take no wife, father no children_ , and doesn't know which way to turn.

He always swore that he would never give the name Snow to another.

"We shouldn't. There isn't anywhere to do it, anyway."

Ygritte's eyes light up – and even if she is no great beauty, she is beautiful to him in this moment, hungry and human and, if not wolfish, then certainly canine and carnal in her desire. "We should. Right here, on the ground and under the stars, in this here roll for warmth. Come now, Jon Snow. Afraid of a naked girl?"

She kisses him once. A second time, biting his bottom lip and dragging him towards her and down to the roll. A third, biting even harder, licking the sting from his lip. Later, he will blame Ghost's lingering thoughts of mates and pack and joining. But for now, it is all he can do to keep his wits about him, as he crawls into the furs and kisses down her chest and further.

If nothing else, he knows his wolf will be proud of him.

* * *

She opens her eyes again, and she is still Sansa but now she is also Bir. Bran and Rickon sleep beneath her, and as quietly as she can she drops down to the elder of her little brothers, and tugs on his hair gently.

Bran launches himself upright, sending Bir flying and successfully flinging Sansa from her raven's mind. The rejoining to her own body is painful and _unappreciated_ , so with a mental hiss Sansa throws herself back again.

Bran is babbling apologies when Bir flaps back down to his lap, hissing and spitting with Sansa's ire.

 _Can you call to Robb again?_ She demands, fierce and furious. Her head is pounding from three consecutive wargs over such great distances, and the stress of the last few years days has finally caught up to her. She is _not_ happy.

"I – I can."

 _I'm going to give you information, and you need to relay the whole thing back to him. Can you do it?_

"Of course I can!"

Sansa concentrates on the scene with Jon, highlighting the information she feels is most necessary for Bran to pass across.

Bran's eyes are so wide with terror, she can clearly see the whites of his eyes. "Marching Dead? Sansa, are you sure?" He chokes out.

 _That is what Jon says. Ygritte did not discredit him._

Bran draws in a shuddery breath, and then raises his voice. "Osha?"

The Wildling woman is up and has her steel bared within seconds. Sansa is impressed, and glad that such a woman is protecting her baby brothers.

"What is it, Little Lord? What's wrong?"

Bran clears his throat, and asks, "What lies beyond the Wall? Why did you leave it?"

The woman has tawny skin, but the moment Bran asks his question she turns as pale as Sansa herself. "What's this for? What's brought this on?"

Bran licks his lips nervously, looks at Sansa and then back up at Osha. "We're wargs, aren't we? Rickon and I."

"… Aye. That's what we'd call you back North, anyway."

"Sansa is too. And Robb, and Arya, and Jon. This raven is Bir, one of Sansa's – partners? Is that the right word?"

Sansa gives him a bird-shrug and a confused trill. She doesn't know either, but she does like the term.

"Sansa just spoke with Jon, through another one of her partners. He says that the Dead are marching South. Are they right?"

"What does it matter?"

 _She's avoiding the question – it_ is _true, and she has a story of her own_ , Sansa advised her brother.

"Who came back to you, Osha?" Bran asks, voice very, very quiet. "Please."

Osha looks like she wants to throw up. "I had a man, once. A _good_ man. Bruni, his name was. I was his, and he was mine. But one night, Bruni disappears. People said he left me, but I knew him. He'd never leave me, not for long. I knew he'd come back, and he did. He came in through the back of the hut. Only it wasn't Bruni, not really. His skin was … _pale_ , like a dead man's. His eyes bluer than clear sky. He came at me, grabbed me at the neck, and squeezed so hard, I could feel the life slipping out of me. I don't know how I got the knife, but when I did, I stuck it deep into his heart. And he hardly seemed to notice! I had to burn our hut down, with him inside. I didn't ask the gods what it meant; I didn't need to, I already knew. It meant the North was no place for men to be, not anymore."

Sansa has terror licking up and down her spine, and it is only long practice that keeps the fear separate from her thoughts, let's her think on what needs be done next.

 _If the Starks and Winterfell offered Brandon's Gift to the Wildlings to tend during Winter, would they accept? If we asked that they mind our laws whilst they're on this side?_ Sansa whispers to Bran. He repeats her questions to Osha slowly, watching the raven that is his sister all the while.

Osha thinks on it, head swaying slowly from side to side as she mulls it over. "Some, mayhaps. Depends on what rules there are, how many. Depends on whether you get Mance Rayder behind it."

"You've said his name before," Bran said. "When we first met, you said you could sell me to Mance for favour with Uncle Benjen. Who is he?"

"He's the King Beyond The Wall, boy. A fierce warrior, and an even better talker."

 _Ygritte and Jon mentioned him, I think. The band that Jon is with might have something to do with him?_

"Could you relay that to Jon?" Bran asks her. "If he's with Mance, he can act on Robb's behalf."

Sansa shakes her head. _You're the only one who can hear me like this. I've tried with everyone except Robb_.

"Why haven't you tried to talk to Robb yet?"

 _I'm still ⎼ I will try, but I don't think it will work. Can you talk to him about this in more detail for me too, please? I think that Arya was going to try and speak with him via the wolves again tonight._

"I can do that, Sansa, don't worry. And, um, sorry again, for before."

 _You better be, little brother._

"You can have all of my lemon cakes for a whole year when we get back to Winterfell, I promise."

Hopefully between Arya and Bran, Robb will believe them. Hopefully, if she can word this correctly, if she can make everything make sense, if she can preempt every argument that the lords will put forward, she can make this work. For now, all she can do is pray.

 _I love you, Bran, you and Rickon both. Arya does too, and Robb and Jon. Don't forget. We'll come for you soon._

* * *

When Summer joins Bran to his siblings, it is to hear Arya and Robb screaming at each other. Shaggydog and Rickon join just behind them, and both are just as confused as Bran and Summer.

 _What's wrong?_ Rickon demanded, high and piercing.

 _Robb is a great big idiot!_

 _Arya is a horrid little brat!_

 _That doesn't tell us anything,_ Bran says despairingly. _Can you stop for a moment, please? Sansa gave me something to share._

 _Was it a continuation of her mad scheme to have Wildlings come South of the Wall?_ Robb snaps. _The Northern and Riverland Lords gave me my crown, they can just as easily take it_ and _my head! We're losing this war, our political position is dangerous at best, and the lords are already grumbling. This could be what ends our house!_

They are all of them still - Rickon is too young to fully understand, but Arya and Bran can see exactly what their big brother means, and Arya lets a loose thought through, Sansa reprimanding her about putting an idea towards a monarch without fully considering every angle.

Another breath, and then Bran draws up Sansa's memory of Jon, his own memory of Osha, and shares them across their bond. Rickon's presence draws closer to his for comfort, Robb jerks back and Arya gives the impression of going _still._

 _We can't leave all of those people to fight the Dead alone. Bran says firmly. Once the Dead run out of Wildlings to fight, they'll try to take the Wall and then come after us. Besides, there isn't much of anyone left in either of the Gifts – why not let the Wildlings make something for themselves here, for the Winter, and then send them back when the Dead are taken care of? Let them fight for us, let them help us take back our home, and help Arya and Rickon keep the North safe._

 _What about you?_ Arya demanded sharply.

 _I need to find the Three Eyed Raven. I_ have _to go Beyond the Wall. I need to know what's happening to me, and how to control it._

 _What does that mean?_ Robb snapped, _bigbrotherworry_ roiling off his impression in waves.

 _My dreams come true, I can – I warg more than I should. Osha says that regular wargs have one partner, until one or the other dies._

 _… But Sansa has four birds_ , Arya said quietly. _Sorrow, Mirth, Ding and Bir. I asked her – and, and Nymeria connects me to her pack!_

 _Birds are easy, Osha says. Dogs, too. The bigger something is, the wilder something is, the harder it becomes to warg. Wolves are supposed to be the hardest, and – and not many people can warg a Direwolf. Nymeria controls her pack, and she shares that with you._

They are all quiet, at that.

 _In my dreams, I see a three-eyed raven. It calls me to it, and Jojen says that there's someone Beyond the Wall who can help me._

 _I'm not leaving you!_ Rickon snarls, more wolf than boy. His emotions are the clearest of all of them, _panic-grief-fear_ swirling in and around each other in a veritable storm.

 _You can't come with me,_ Bran says softly. _If anything happens to me, then you're Robb's heir. You and Arya_ have _to take Winterfell back, and you have to_ keep it. _In my dreams, the crypts keep calling to me, saying that_ there must always be a Stark in Winterfell. _We can't leave it to someone else. I don't know why, but something… really bad will happen, if Winterfell is without us. Please, Rickon, Arya, you have to take it back!_

 _We can't take it back without any help!_ Arya exclaims. _Robb, how many can the Mountain Clans give us – a thousand men? Two?_

 _… Less than that. Many sent men south with me._

 _Nymeria's pack numbers less than five hundred. You want me to find Rickon, take back Winterfell, hold it, and rule in your place with_ maybe _a thousand fighters, half of which can't even scale the_ walls _?!_

 _The Wildlings are going to cross the Wall regardless_ , Bran offers. _That's how Osha's here. Speak to the lords. Speak with Mother and your Mate. Try and find a way for us to get the Wildlings on our side, get Jon_ south _of the Wall, and bring our pack back together again._

The wolves have been hanging off of their thoughts and following closely – Summer and Shaggy from their place amongst tree roots, Grey Wind from Robb's featherbed, Nymeria stalking a beast for her dinner. They four all back what Bran's saying, but just because it fits wolf-logic doesn't mean it will work for man-logic.

 _It isn't that easy!_ Robb growled, giving the impression of running his fingers through his hair. _How in seven hells do I explain all of this to my men? They would laugh me from the room, if not demand my head right there!_

 _Then we need to convince them,_ Arya snapped. _We need a way for you to be able to talk to Sansa too, Robb, she's good at ideas now that she's not pretending to be an idiot. When we get there, Sansa and I will have to find a way to make it common knowledge, what we are and what we can do. Hopefully we can_ make _them see that this is what we need to do!_

 _If you're to be in Robb's Small Council, they may as well get used to it,_ Bran offers, his impression tired and ready to actually _sleep_ when he's asleep.

Robb was taken aback by the statement. _What do you mean?_

 _Sansa is your Master of Whispers,_ Rickon said. _And Arya your Master of Law. Right, Bran?_

The impressions flicker across from King to Wolfgirl like lightning across a stormy sky.

 _Shock-disbelief-humour._

 _Rage-pique-determination._

Horseface-Underfoot-ratnesthair-and-knobblyelbows-and-scabscollectedliketrophies-and-blurtinganythingandeverythingthatcametomind. Perfectlady-futurequeen-sewing-and-stories-and-lemoncakes-and-courtesies-and-fancyhair.

Arry-Lumpyhead-Stickboy-Rabbitkiller-Weasel-Nymeria-Nan-Squab-No-One-Waterdancer-warrior- _wolfblood-bloodslickonfingershandtightonthehilt._ Sansa-practicepracticepractice-stringdrawshoot- _singthebirdsdownstealtheletterstakeitinandkeepit-arrowheavyinheartthroatbelly-pullitoutandcleanitdaintilyandsmile._

Shock. Disbelief. Worry.

 _We'll show you_ , Arya snarled. Nymeria's presence growled over and under hers, the two blending together such that it was difficult to tell where girl or beast began. _Sansa has her birds, has her reports. I will mete the Northern justice. I will make the Lords listen, and you too, if I have to!_

Nymeria and Arya leave the joining. Rickon and Bran exchanged "looks", before turning to Robb.

 _She'll sheep-shift you,_ was Rickon's verdict.

 _I wondered what it was, that had Sansa so mad at you_ , said Bran. _She's refused to speak about you the last few times she's warged to me. If you're not careful, she'll help Arya, and you'll have earnt it._

 _They're girls. My Lords won't listen to them, and will have all our heads for it._

 _They are Starks,_ Bran corrected.

 _They are wolves_ , Rickon added. _They both killed people, trying to get back to you. They'll kill more, if they need to. I'm sleepy – tell Mother I love her._ He and Shaggy were gone, too.

Robb and Bran were left to "stare" at each other's impression.

 _You can't treat us like babies anymore ⎼ we aren't the same people who left Winterfell. We need to work together. Hear their ideas._

 _How? Any plans Sansa might come up with will be sensitive, and you can't trust that to a ravenscroll. I can't hear her, like you can ⎼ I know she's been in Mirth in my presence before, and I never heard a thing._

Bran's impression is that of a gnawed-on lip, thoughts skipping across the connection like so many ripples in a pond. _She writes things out for Jon, and I think she did the same for Arya too. If you have something handy for her, like a pre-written alphabet that she can peck out for you, that might help!_

Robb's own mind is roilling now, thoughts flashing nearly as quickly as Bran's. _I think I can work with that. Thank you, Bran._

Bran's impression glows at the praise. _I'm tired too, I've been warging too much. We'll talk more tomorrow. Love you._

 _And I you, little brother. Be safe. I have… a lot to think about._

* * *

They leave before the predawn, once again.

 _Don't give an inch,_ Arya had told her before she and a half-asleep Gendry had ridden out. B _ran told us of your plan last night – figure out the logistics. Get the numbers, of any and every house you can. Find their loyalties, prove yourself, and fuck the_ lords up.

Sansa hadn't had the wherewithal to scold Arya for her language. She was too caught up in the rage that burnt bright and hot in her sister's eyes, and in trying to determine how she would achieve such a request.

 _We are Northern too, we daughters of Winterfell. And we're going to_ show _them!_

None of this, of course, told Sansa anything actually _helpful_ , did not give her the backstory and the context necessary to narrow down her search. Oh, how Sansa misses the Arya of old, who never stopped talking and would explain anything and everything given half a chance! Whatever had happened in the night, whatever decisions had or hadn't been made, Arya had not felt the need to share it with Sansa before she dragged Gendry and two spare horses to the Hall.

 _Porcelain. Ivory. Steel._

She drags in a deep breath and calls up her goodsisters, Talisa and Ygritte Always before she had relied on thoughts of Winterfell, of Mother and Robb, to give her strength. Now she needs a different kind of strength that perhaps she could not find in even her fierce mother.

Another breath, and she combs her hair out with her fingers, keeping her breaths even and thinking everything over. Carefully, she sorts out her thoughts and pulls the hair from the front of her forehead back and braids it carefully. Sections it off at each temple, braids it back again. Braids the three together, ties it off, leaves the rest free, like Ygritte.

With every piece of hair that she tugs into submission, she calls up what she does know, the problems she must now face, the solutions to them.

The Northern houses, best she can tell, are all loyal to her brother. She would assume the same for the Riverlords, but she knows that Walder Frey holds no love for either her brother or grandfather. So, how does she determine their loyalties? Her birds are the obvious answer, but words are wind. Could she warg ravens into the chambers and solars of every lord in the Riverlands? No, surely not – she would go mad! And have no definitive proof, besides.

She needs to pull in more ravens. She needs to _know_. She needs to ⎼

She needs to _sing_.

It is too dark, yet, but she is sure that once the dawn kisses that horizon, if she sings and dances to _Three Ravens_ once more then she could call more birds to her. She has faith in this and in herself.

This is the solution to but one problem. She has a veritable list to work through, so keeps going, breathing steady and slow, hands sure in her hair, as she slowly plaits the rest of it into the loose fashion she has seen Talisa favour.

How shall she best present her knowledge to Robb's Small Council? The marriage requests that she has intercepted, those she shall keep to herself – certainly if the marriage doesn't affect the war effort, then the Lords who surround her big brother won't much care for that knowledge. The discussions of inheritance may prove useful later on, but not while the Northern host is still in the Riverlands.

And of course, there's the mess with Walder Frey that is still unclear to her. She might be able to tell Robb of what she knows, but there is not enough knowledge to justify – anything. She needs solid information, and she needs to know how to keep her brother's head upon his shoulders. She could not watch a second Stark beheading. She is certain that she would surely break, if it were to happen again. She cannot – she _cannot_ – lose any more of her family, especially not now that she is so close. So, she needs another bird to place at the Twins. She can … Sorrow she called to her, and Mirth too, with her singing. Bir and Ding she found by dreaming of her brothers. Can she do the same with someone she has never met? She supposes that she will find out with the dawn. _Five is for laughing._

And then there is the mess that is the Eyrie: Petyr Baelish, Aunt Lysa, the Knights of the Vale. Aunt Lysa had refused Mother already, Sansa thinks – Lord Tyrion had mentioned that Mother had kept him captive there, during the early days of Father's captivity and her own political cage. The Vale has thus far remained neutral in the War of Five Kings, so there must be _something_ that caused Aunt Lysa to deny her men to her nephew's cause. Which means she probably needs another raven for the East. _Six is for crying._

She still has a ways to wait until the dawn. Time enough to collect herself further, ready herself for the wargings and calling ahead of her. Time enough to _plan_.

She sketches out a map of Westeros in the dirt, marking towns and hamlets with pebbles or rocks, larger castles with a stick shoved into the ground. She makes little boats out of leaves, places those around Dragonstone, Lannisport, Sapphire Isle, Pyke, the Arbour. Her pack is filled with loose feathers from Sorrow, Mirth and all the rest of them; she uses these to denote lots of hundred soldiers, based on what her correspondances and Arya have been able to tell her, what she remembers from her long-ago lessons with Maester Luwin and what she overheard herself in court.

When the grey light of dawn slowly brightens their clearing, she is ready. She knows the words, how she'll sing them and how she'll dance them. She knows how many birds she would like to call to her, and, with that done, she will then try for her fifth and sixth companions.

 _"There were three ravens, sat on a tree,  
_ _Down a down, hay down, hay down,  
_ _There were three ravens sat on tree,  
_ _with a down,  
_ _There were three ravens sat on a tree,  
_ _They were as black as they might be,  
_ _With a down, derrie, derrie, derrie, down, down."_

* * *

The court was quiet this morning, far more reserved than they had been before, excepting when the word of Ned's ⎼ of Ned had come through. Talisa had gone with young Jorelle Mormont to collect herbs, or something, and her absence from the council meeting was noticed and very obviously Not Commented Upon.

There were heavy bags under Robb's eyes, and despite the beard he had been growing over the course of this war, he was still just a boy, her first boy, and her heart ached to see him so world-weary so young.

"My Lords," Robb began, taking his seat at the head of the table. Sansa's strange bird, Mirth, was on his shoulder, and there was a slate and chalk by his elbow, already scribbled upon. "Some of you are already aware that my sisters are no-longer in the Lannisters' hands, and have been making their way here to join our company."

There were cheers and fists banging on the table. When it had quieted again, Robb looked each man in the eye, his face hard. "You know what they say about the Northern Host, my lords. You know what they say of our ancestors from the Age of Heros, and the magicks that they would utilise. Even the Lady Maege holds claim to the title - _warg. Skinchanger._ My Lords, you've grown familiar, too, with this raven."

Catelyn felt her own eyes widen as she places what it was, exactly, that her son was implying.

"My sisters are close, and have gathered information for our cause, at much personal cost. They have captured the Kingslayer, and will bring him here when they know that their demands are met."

Outrage.

No one lord can be heard over the others, but when Robb slams the hilt of his sword onto the table, they are all equally silenced.

"Lord Karstark, you want Jaime Lannister's head for the sons that you lost," Robb _growls_ , eyes lit with a barely-controlled rage as he slides the blade back into its sheath. "Your bloodlust is well deserved, your vengeance something I wish to give you, now that there is no risk of my sisters' suffering in exchange. The Red Crow and the Water Wolf both, however, ask that you send him to the Wall to act as a trainer to the Nights Watch recruits." Lord Rickard's face twists, but Robb snaps over top of him.

"They do not ask this _lightly_ , my lord! There is more." Here those angry blue eyes turn to Roose Bolton. "The men you sent into Harrenhal ⎼ did they speak of a weasel soup at all, my lord?"

Implacable as ever, the Leech Lord doesn't even blink. After a beat of silence, he inclines his head.

"Speak to those men again. Ask them about the little girl whose bravery allowed them to escape back to us. Remind me, Lord Bolton ⎼ how many men did she save?"

"One hundred men, your grace. Though, I would hesitate to say _saved_ ⎼ the men there were part of a ploy to ⎼ "

"They arrived just as Lord Tywin had ordered the execution of every single person that was not a Lannister soldier. Arya's actions are all that allowed those men to escape, and to keep their lives. Greatjon!"

"Yes!"

"The number of Night's Watch deserters have increased in the last five years, have they not?"

"Yes, my king." The big man nodded, puzzled.

"Do you know why? Or why the Wildlings have been trying harder than ever to cross to this side of the Wall?"

"...No, your grace."

Robb nods back, runs a hand through his hair, and speaks lowly. "The woman who helped my brothers escape the sacking of Winterfell is a Wildling called Osha. She says that the dead are stirring, that wights and White Walkers march on the Wall. Her husband died and came back, and tried to kill her. The attack is what prompted her to cross the Wall. My brother, Jon Snow, tells me that he has seen the walking dead, too, has seen living babies taken to be turned into something else. He is with the King Beyond the Wall as we speak, gathering information on behalf of the Watch."

The bird on his shoulder is slumped and weary, but when Robb glances to it, Mirth straightens and gives an encouraging sort of nod.

"My sister Sansa wishes to take the position of Master of Whispers for the Northern Sovereignty. The information she has so far collected is not yet on par with the Spider, but she is young and learning still, and promises me that by the years' end she will be on par with, if not surpassing, Lord Varys. She believes that she can sway the Vale to our cause to help us finish this war." Robb looks to Catelyn then, and now she knows why she was invited to this council. "Mother, Sansa wants you to write everything you can concerning Aunt Lysa, the Vale, and Peter Baelish out for her. No memory, fact or rumour is to be discredited. Current estimates put the Vale forces at around forty-five thousand men. Should Sansa be successful, she asks that all of the Northern Mountain Clans go back north with Arya, to help retake Winterfell and free the North from the Ironborn."

Hugo Wull stands at that.

"The Mountains can only provide shy of a thousand men. That's enough for Winterfell, aye, but not enough for Pyke."

Robb nods again, standing and moving to the war table. "We know. I've discussed this at great length with both of my sisters, and they have an idea. My lords, you will not like it, but it is all we have left to us."

Mirth hops from Robb's shoulder to the table, picks up a series of feathers and buttons that were behind the section of map that marked the Wall, and steadily places each piece in Brandon's Gift. Stark Wolves are rolled from Riverrun to the Northern coastlines, and Arryn Falcons are pushed into the Westerlands. Mirth looks up at the gathered lords, gives a chirp and a bird bow, before taking up residence at Robb's elbow, by the slate.

"Winter is coming." Robb says, every inch the King in the North that they have named him. "We all know it, my lords, this long Summer is going to end. We can't waste the time that remains to us fighting when we need to gather our harvests for the Winter - for if the Summer lasted ten years, what is to stop the Winter from lasting just as long?"

Grumbles of acceptance sound from most of the lords, but there are those who look suspicious, eyeing the markers that Mirth had shifted.

"We can't spare anyone from the war effort. We can't expect our women to do everything on their own. My lords, as much as it pains me to say it, we need help. If we allow the Wildlings beyond the Wall for the duration of Autumn and Winter, we can use them to help with the harvest, route the Ironborn, and defeat the Dead without adding too many more to their numbers."

 _This is it,_ Cat thinks morbidly, _this is how he dies, and the gods see fit to make me watch._

"I would hear your council, my lords, one by one. Lord Umber, the Last Hearth is the closest holdfast. What say you?"

The Greatjon rarely hesitated, but Cat supposed there was a first time for everything. "Wildlings have raided, raped and murdered Northerners for generations, your grace. What makes you think that they will hold with us for the next dozen years?"

"Their current King is well-respected, by all accounts. If we deal with Mance Rayder, he will keep his people in line. If he does not, then they will suffer the same consequences as any Northman would. We all want to live, and I can only imagine that the Wildlings would be the same.

"Lord Norrey, Lord Flint? What of the Mountains?"

Brandon "the Younger" Norrey and young Donnel Flint exchanged looks. Both were young men, and both were older than Robb, one by ten and the other by five years, respectively.

Donnel pulled a face, and quoted, " _I am the sword in the darkness, the watcher on the wall. I am the shield that guards the realms of men._ All Mountain men know those words, the First Flints and Norreys especially. We have given many sons and the occasional daughter to the Night's Watch, and ever have we wondered why such a huge piece of magic was needed to block out common men. Ever have we wondered on the oath ⎼ _guards the **realms of men**._ It is an unusual oath, and one we had thought the answer to which lost to time. But if what your brother says is true, that dead men march on the Wall ⎼ that gives the oaths new meaning."

Brandon grumbled something under his breath in what Cat was sure was the Old Tongue, before adding, "I don't like it. Most won't stand for it, not the Norrey and not the Flint, and not any of the other Clanheads to the Mountains. But the Ned is gone, and it's the Young Wolf what'll keep us through the Long Night. If the Water Wolf is taking back the North, have her take notes to the oldies too, your grace. Mayhaps your words will reach them, and mayhaps your sister will convince 'em. Won't know till we try."

Robb gives them both a nod, before turning to Rickard Karstark and Galbart Glover.

Rickard bares his teeth and keeps his council ⎼ a small miracle! ⎼ whilst Galbart fidgets his fingers, thumb to fore, thumb to fore to middle, thumb to fore to middle to ring, thumb to fore to middle to ring to pinky and back down again. It was a practiced motion that the wartable recognised as a sign of deep thought, for the Lord of Deepwood Motte never seemed to notice that he was doing it.

"You are right, my King, in that few will like this plan. But my seat, my brother and his family and our ward, they are all prisoners to the Ironborn, and I would do almost anything to see them free again. I do not know if this is one of them."

"If the laws that we wished kept were written up and distributed to each settlement, with the rules and their consequences outlined and the word of the King Beyond the Wall in place, would that move a ways to settling your concern?"

The finger twitches were now happening on both hands.

"No raping, no stealing, no murder," Galbart said finally. "So long as it is understood that these, most of all, will not be tolerated, then I could live with it."

Mirth flits away and back, bringing a sheet of paper, then a quill, and finally an inkwell to Robb's side. He jots down notes, before turning to Lord Rickard. Still the old Lord is silent, so Robb turns to the next lord, Roose.

There is no change in the Leech Lord's face that Catelyn could perceive, and yet her daughter's bird suddenly straightens out of it's exhausted slump, turns so that it's back is to the table, and taps at the slate at six different spots. Robb's eyes tighten at the corners, and then both return their attention to Lord Bolton.

"Forgive me, your grace, but just so it is clear to me: you mean to let savages through the Wall and allow them to settle the North. You intend to allow them access to our food, our lands and our women, whilst we are away. You expect your younger siblings ⎼ boys of ten-and-two and nine, and a _girl_ of three-and-ten ⎼ to be able to control and order these … _people_ enough to take back the North?"

Mirth made a hissing noise, stalking forward with an angry croak, wings out to either side.

"Mirth," Robb spoke firmly. The bird pulled itself up, gave another, more threatening, hiss, and hopped back to Robb's side. "You have fair points, Lord Bolton, though I fear you have taken this far out of proportion. I have full faith in my siblings. They are children, true, but they are still _alive_ , and that speaks highly in their favour during this War. Bran handled the rule of Winterfell better than any had though, despite his age and disability, prior to the Ironborns' attack. Arya has been on the road and surviving since our Father's death, has rescued more than just the men of Harrenhal. Sansa has escaped Kings Landing, has thrown together her own network of whispers, her own contingencies to help the war effort. If nothing else, my lords, give them a chance. We are Starks and Wolves both. We will not fail the North, not with the coming storm."

Emotionless as ever, but that damned bird is puffing up again, taps one foot six times, as if in reminder. Robb brushes one finger down the black back, makes a low noise in the back of his throat, and looks every lord in the eye.

Maege Mormont stands.

"We named you King," she says, projecting her scratchy voice about the room. "We named you King because we put our faith in you to lead us, to help us protect our homes. Are you sure this is the best way?"

"My Lady, this is the only way. If we do not act soon, we will die."

She stares him down, then turns to the bird. Mirth pulls itself upright, almost _proud_ , and old Maege _cackles_. "Well, alright then! Bear Island will accept fifty Wildlings - our island is small, but if they promise to behave, I'm sure we can work something out! Lyra, write to your sister. And you, you hesitant shits!" This she snaps out to the gathered lords with her usual caustic humour, eyeballing the Lords Umber, Norrey and Flint in particular. "What will you allow past the Gift?"

* * *

Raventree Hall, it turns out, was a great big fucking mistake.

Oh, it was all well and good to begin with - they got the threads and cloth for Sansa, the vegetables and flour for Hot Pie, sold the horses and smithed enough to keep their coffers and Gendry's senses happy. But they had thought to indulge themselves again, share a room and a featherbed at the inn and enjoy food that wasn't mostly rabbit and wild herbs.

When they return from the forge ⎼ later than they had meant, staying back longer to finish a series of horseshoes that could be sold at the hamlets they had seen on their way to the Hall, nails that could earn them an extra pretty penny, if they were careful ⎼ it is to find the innkeeper's daughter being taken by two men in the back corner. She had smiled at them this morning, winked at Gendry and told him he was sweet for looking after such an unruly little brother, had mussed Arya's hair and informed her that she would grow up handsome. This morning's locals are gone, the barflies are gone, and there are Lannister soldiers supping at the tables.

 _Worse_ , there is Polliver, and at his belt is Needle.

They both of them freeze in the doorway, but before they can try to escape, they are pulled into the inn by one of the men, some pimply man-child less than twenty but more than five-and-ten. Arya's senses she sends out to Nymeria, sends out her terror, urging her wolf to rush. The link between the wolves is open, though, and in the back of her head Arya can feel Grey Wind, Summer and Shaggy all lifting their heads to join Nymeria's howl.

"That's good steel, castle forged." Polliver growls out, piggy eyes latching onto the swords at their hips ⎼ Arya's Lannister blade, Gendry's Bolton forged. "How did a couple of chickens like you end up with that?"

"I'm a smith," Gendry stuttered, tugging at the back of Arya's tunic, trying to get her behind him.

"You made these?"

Gendry _can't_ lie, Arya knows this, whether he answers them verbally or not won't matter because his guilty face is what will get them _killed_ , so she pipes up for him. "Took 'em from a battle corpse, m'lord. Weren't no one living using 'em, they just bin left behind, like."

Wolf howls echo in her head. She prefers it to the screaming of her heart, her memories, _maybe I'll pick my teeth with it._

Where are the castle guards? Whatever lord is here, _surely_ they cannot abide this happening to their smallfolk!

"Stole 'em, did you, boy? Stole from the Crown?"

"It weren't stealin', m'lord, it was just out in the open! Noone wanted it!" There are five men, including Polliver. They are all armed and armoured. Gendry is improving in leaps and bounds thanks to Brienne and the Hound, and Arya's own skills grew daily, but they were still _learning_ , and these were battle hardened soldiers.

They were so close to her family, and they were going to die.

Gendry's hand is fisted in the back of her tunic, and it is shaking. He knows it too, and she regrets the times she called him _stupid bull_. He isn't, not really, and she knows these thoughts are surfacing because of their impending deaths.

The man who dragged them inside steps forward, smiling terribly and drawing his own sword. "What do you need blades for, if you can't even use them?"

 _Sorry_ , she breaths to Gendry before she launches herself forward with her blade leading. Brienne advised her to use her speed against larger foes, to play to her advantages. She can only hope for the best.

 _aaaaaaWOOOOOOOOOOOOoooooooo!_

It is five to two and they can't do this, they _can't_ , but they can't give up either, and she has slipped inside the guard of the soldier and cut his throat with her beltknife and Polliver and another are on her, and Gendry has the other two but he's been _cut_ , and it's only a matter of time before she is injured too, and they. are. going. to. _die_.

The door slams open, and a direwolf barrels inside. Arya has enough thought to register grey fur and snarling jaws snapping shut about the throat of the second guard, before her sword cuts into Polliver's now-exposed back.

"Something wrong with your leg, boy?" She growls, kicking him over so that she can look him in the eye. "I'll need to carry you?!" She sheaths her belt knife, takes her stolen sword into her right hand and yanks Needle free with her left. Holding her sword aloft, she hisses, "Maybe I'll pick my teeth with it!" Needle darts into his neck just as terrified understanding blooms in Polliver's eyes, and then Arya is off again, flinging herself at Gendry's attackers. Galloping hooves signal from outside, and then there a person throwing themselves through the door.

An axe takes off the head of the second man on Gendry, and Arya is freed up to try and run-through the man who had hurt her friend. The Lannister sword and the axe swing in at the same time and meet in the middle. The last guard is dead, and Arya finds herself staring at a stocky girl-child of perhaps four-and-ten. Behind her is a taller woman with dark skin and darker hair, a healers apron on and her hair in a loose braid, a heavy satchel over one shoulder.

The Direwolf gets up from his meal, stepping forward to sniff at Arya.

"Grey Wind," She breath, scuffing behind his ears. She looks at the two women again, takes in the green bear on the girl and the exasperation of the woman.

"Arya Underfoot?" The woman askes.

Arya's hands shake, even with her fingers buried in Grey Wind's fur. "You're Talisa, aren't you? It is ⎼ it is good to finally meet you, goodsister."

"You have great timing, your grace," Gendry says, dipping into a bow that ends in a feint. Gods _damn_ it, at least they aren't fucking dead.

* * *

 _"Can you be without Grey Wind for half of a week?"_

 _"Wh – yes?"_

 _"I have a plan. I'll go to the girls with Grey to tend to any injuries, and see what is keeping them away. What you are going to tell the men is that I needed more herbs, special ones. I'm travelling to collect them with Grey Wind, and will return soon. Lend me one of Lady Maege's daughters, the youngest one here, as a guard and proof of loyalty. I'll find and tend your sisters, and we'll all come back to you together. How's that sound?"_

 _Robb scoops her to him, holds her tight and breathes in the scent of her with his nose smashed against her neck, before kissing her hotly. "Thank you, Talisa._ Thank you _."_

 _"I expect you to do the same, should my brother ever come across the Narrow Sea. Now give me a proper send off – if I'm going to be travelling around on your wolf, I may as well smell of you as much as we're able."_

 _With a happy growl, Robb rolled his queen over, kisses raining hot and heavy, hands moving to touch and hold as much of her as possible._

* * *

 **It's NaNoWriMo season! Remember me fondly, and hopefully we'll be able to hook back into some semblance of normality before Christmas.**


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